356 Ch.

7 Itinerant Electron Magnetism

a large spin susceptibility. It is thought that the anomalously large

susceptibility of Pd is basically of such a nature.
Actually, we can use (7.22) also for asserting that the order param-
eter must be finite if U is large enough. Let us set the external field
H = 0. Then the total energy

A&(m) = m2 (- 1
PkF)
-U)

consists of two terms: spin polarization costs band energy which goes
as m2;and it gains interaction energy which is also proportional to m2.
The energy is minimized by m = 0 if U < U z , while for U > V;, the
energy is lowered by making m finite. Just how large m will be, cannot
be decided unless we return to the full energy expression (7.21) (see
Problem 7.2).
It is enlightening to replace (7.18) back into the decoupled form of
the Hamiltonian. Using the identity cjfijiLj,
= EkfikiLj,, we get

where (for H = 0)

(7.27)

The spin-? and spin-4 bands are split by an energy which is proportional
to the magnetization. This so-called exchange splittingl6 is an important
concept in theories of band ferromagnetism.
To conclude: at which values of the band filling can we expect fer-
romagnetism? As long as we have nothing but the Stoner criterion, we
must answer: at all fillings, because for any ~ ( E F #
) 0, (7.24) predicts

I6It is traditional terminology and it should not worry us that in the present
treatment, U is a direct Coulomb matrix element, not an exchange matrix element.
In any case, when the Stoner model is applied to complicated systems like transition
metals, the U identifiable from the exchange splitting is an effective coupling which
contains contributions from a variety of sources.