Metallic ferromagnetism in the Kondo lattice.

Abstract

Metallic magnetism is both ancient and modern, occurring in such familiar settings as the lodestone in compass needles and the hard drive in computers. Surprisingly, a rigorous theoretical basis for metallic ferromagnetism is still largely missing. The Stoner approach perturbatively treats Coulomb interactions when the latter need to be large, whereas the Nagaoka approach incorporates thermodynamically negligible holes into a half-filled band. Here, we show that the ferromagnetic order of the Kondo lattice is amenable to an asymptotically exact analysis over a range of interaction parameters. In this ferromagnetic phase, the conduction electrons and local moments are strongly coupled but the Fermi surface does not enclose the latter (i.e., it is "small"). Moreover, non-Fermi-liquid behavior appears over a range of frequencies and temperatures. Our results provide the basis to understand some long-standing puzzles in the ferromagnetic heavy fermion metals, and raise the prospect for a new class of ferromagnetic quantum phase transitions.