Strange Metallicity and Magnetic Order in the CoNi(Cr/V) Medium-Entropy Alloy System

CoNiCr is a prototypical example of topical multi-principle element alloys with superior cryogenic and high-temperature mechanical strength, corrosion, oxidation resistance, and yet-to-be-explored magnetic and electronic functionalities. The remarkable properties of this transition metal ternary system are not only due to atomic radii, electronic configurational mismatch, and atomic volume misfit but are also dependent on the debated magnetically driven chemical short-range order. The current study focuses on the electric and magnetic properties of the single-phase face-centered cubic CoNi(Cr/V) system in which V is introduced to the system at the expense of Cr to fine-tune the volume misfit in the system. All the samples exhibited ultra-small magnetic moments due to the complex magnetic interactions of the constituent elements. The electric transport measurements revealed a strange metallicity evidenced through the observation of the linear temperature dependence of the resistivity. Our findings support the recent theoretical studies on the magnetically driven chemical short-range order of the CoNiCr system.