An interesting characteristic of magnetite is the phase transition from an f.c.c. arrangement to orthorhombic occurring near 115 K. In the orthorhombic phase the c-axis coincides with one of the cubic [loo] axes while the a-and b-axes lie along (110) directions (1).
0When a steady magnetic field H is applied to a crystal of magnetite as it is cooled through the transition temperature, the cube edge that lies nearest to the magnetic field is selected a s the c-axis of the orthorhombic structure, This direction, however, can be influenced below the transition temperature, by applying a field in direction of another cube edge (2).
trThe magnetoresistance (MR) of magnetite was investigated many years ago and was found to be either positive or negative (3). Its dependence on the magnetic field was further investigated in a number of papers (4 to 8).In the present paper the MR of synthetic and natural magnetite was measured in a working field H directions of H and H magnetite') had a cylindrical shape with the axis along the [110] direction. This was also the direction of the electric current. Ohmic contacts were obtained by soldering indium to the samples after wetting them with In-Hg amalgam. Two samples of natural magnetite were used of parallelepiped shape with dimensions 1 x 4~1 2 mm , and with the large face a s the (111) plane. The electric current was along the [liO] direction. The magnetic field was always along the [lll] direction. up to 1 1 kG, after cooling under various H W tr up to 10 kG. The were always parallel to each other. The sample of synthetic W tr 3 Before each measurement the sample was demagnetized. After each measurement of MR versus Hw the samples were annealed up to room temperature, then 1) The sample was kindly offered by Prof. B. Luthi of Rutgers University, and was grown at the I. B. M. Research Laboratory.