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Note: This paper is part of the Special Topic on Multicalorics.

Reactive single-step hot-pressing at 1473 K and 35 MPa for 4 h produces dense, bulk, near single-phase, low-cost, and low-criticality Fe2Al1.15B2 and Fe2Al1.1B2Ge0.05Ga0.05 MAB samples, showing second-order magnetic phase transition with favorable magnetocaloric properties around room temperature. The magnetic as well as the magnetocaloric properties can be tailored upon Ge and Ga doping, leading to an increase in the Curie temperature TC and the spontaneous magnetization mS. The maximum isothermal entropy change ΔsT,max of hot-pressed Fe2Al1.15B2 in magnetic field changes of 2 and 5 T amounts to 2.5 and 5 J(kgK)−1 at 287.5 K and increases by Ge and Ga addition to 3.1 and 6.2 J(kgK)−1 at 306.5 K, respectively. The directly measured maximum adiabatic temperature change ΔTad,max is improved by composition modification from 0.9 to 1.1 K in magnetic field changes of 1.93 T. Overall, we demonstrate that hot-pressing provides a much faster, more scalable, and processing costs reducing alternative compared to conventional synthesis routes to produce heat exchangers for magnetic cooling devices. Therefore, our criticality assessment shows that hot-pressed Fe-based MAB phases provide a promising compromise of material and processing costs, criticality, and magnetocaloric performance, demonstrating the potential for low-cost and low-criticality magnetocaloric applications around room temperature.

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Zero thermal expansion (ZTE) composites are typically designed by combining positive thermal expansion (PTE) with negative thermal expansion (NTE) materials acting as compensators and have many diverse applications, including in high-precision instrumentation and biomedical devices. La­(Fe1–x ,Si x )­13-based compounds display several remarkable properties, such as giant magnetocaloric effect and very large NTE at room temperature. Both are linked via strong magnetovolume coupling, which leads to sharp magnetic and volume changes occurring simultaneously across first-order phase transitions; the abrupt nature of these changes makes them unsuitable as thermal expansion compensators. To make these materials more useful practically, the mechanisms controlling the temperature over which this transition occurs and the magnitude of contraction need to be controlled. In this work, ball-milling was used to decrease particles and crystallite sizes and increase the strain in LaFe11.9Mn0.27Si1.29H x alloys. Such size and strain tuning effectively broadened the temperature over which this transition occurs. The material’s NTE operational temperature window was expanded, and its peak was suppressed by up to 85%. This work demonstrates that induced strain is the key mechanism controlling these materials’ phase transitions. This allows the optimization of their thermal expansion toward room-temperature ZTE applications.