Application of the finite-temperature Lanczos method for the evaluation of magnetocaloric properties of large magnetic molecules

We discuss the magnetocaloric properties of gadolinium containing magnetic molecules, which potentially could be used for sub-Kelvin cooling. We show that a degeneracy of a singlet ground state could be advantageous in order to support adiabatic processes to low temperatures and simultaneously minimize disturbing dipolar interactions. Since the Hilbert spaces of such spin systems assume very large dimensions, we evaluate the necessary thermodynamic observables by means of the finite-temperature Lanczos method. Copyright EDP Sciences, SIF, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013