No Arabic abstract
The candidate magnetoelectric Pb3Mn7O15 has a structure consisting of 1/3 filled Kagome layers linked by ribbons of edge-sharing octahedra in the stacking direction. Previous reports have indicated a complex hexagonal-orthorhombic structural transition upon cooling to room temperature, although its origins are uncertain. Here both structures are revisited using a combination of neutron and synchrotron X-ray diffraction data. Large shifts of oxygen positions are detected which show that the interlayer sites and those which occupy voids in the kagome lattice are trivially charge ordered in both phases. The symmetry breaking is found to occur due to Mn3+ orbital ordering on the ribbon sites and charge ordering of the sub-set of layer sites which make up a Kagome network.
We report a ground state with strongly coupled magnetic and charge density wave orders mediated via orbital ordering in the layered compound tbt. In addition to the commensurate antiferromagnetic (AFM) and charge density wave (CDW) orders, new magnetic peaks are observed whose propagation vector equals the sum of the AFM and CDW propagation vectors, revealing an intricate and highly entwined relationship. This is especially interesting given that the magnetic and charge orders lie in different layers of the crystal structure where the highly localized magnetic moments of the Tb$^{3+}$ ions are netted in the Tb-Te stacks, while the charge order is formed by the conduction electrons of the adjacent Te-Te layers. Our results, based on neutron diffraction and resonant x-ray scattering reveal that the charge and magnetic subsystems mutually influence each other via the orbital ordering of Tb$^{3+}$ ions.
We report a high-resolution neutron diffraction study of the crystal and magnetic structure of the orbitally-degenerate frustrated metallic magnet AgNiO2. At high temperatures the structure is hexagonal with a single crystallographic Ni site, low-spin Ni3+ with spin-1/2 and two-fold orbital degeneracy, arranged in an antiferromagnetic triangular lattice with frustrated spin and orbital order. A structural transition occurs upon cooling below 365 K to a tripled hexagonal unit cell containing three crystallographically-distinct Ni sites with expanded and contracted NiO6 octahedra, naturally explained by spontaneous charge order on the Ni triangular layers. No Jahn-Teller distortions occur, suggesting that charge order occurs in order to lift the orbital degeneracy. Symmetry analysis of the inferred Ni charge order pattern and the observed oxygen displacement pattern suggests that the transition could be mediated by charge fluctuations at the Ni sites coupled to a soft oxygen optical phonon breathing mode. At low temperatures the electron-rich Ni sublattice (assigned to a valence close to Ni2+ with S = 1) orders magnetically into a collinear stripe structure of ferromagnetic rows ordered antiferromagnetically in the triangular planes. We discuss the stability of this uncommon spin order pattern in the context of an easy-axis triangular antiferromagnet with additional weak second neighbor interactions and interlayer couplings.
We thoroughly examine the ground state of the triangular lattice of Pb on Si(111) using scanning tunneling microscopy. We detect charge-order, accompanied by a subtle structural reconstruction. Applying the extended variational cluster approach we map out the phase diagram as a function of local and non-local Coulomb interactions. Comparing the experimental data with the theoretical modeling leads us to conclude that electron correlations are the driving force of the charge-ordered state in Pb/Si(111), rather than Fermi surface nesting. These results resolve the discussion about the origin of the well known $3times 3$ reconstruction forming below $86,$K. By exploiting the tunability of correlation strength, hopping parameters and bandfilling, this material class represents a promising platform to search for exotic states of matter, in particular, for chiral topological superconductivity.
We report a high-resolution neutron diffraction study on the orbitally-degenerate spin-1/2 hexagonal antiferromagnet AgNiO2. A structural transition to a tripled unit cell with expanded and contracted NiO6 octahedra indicates root(3) x root(3) charge order on the Ni triangular lattice. This suggests charge order as a possible mechanism of lifting the orbital degeneracy in the presence of charge fluctuations, as an alternative to Jahn-Teller distortions. A novel magnetic ground state is observed at base temperatures with the electron-rich S = 1 Ni sites arranged in alternating ferromagnetic rows on a triangular lattice, surrounded by a honeycomb network of non-magnetic and metallic Ni ions. We also report first-principles band-structure calculations that explain microscopically the origin of these phenomena.
The collective behavior of correlated electrons in the VO$_2-$interface layer of LaVO$_3$/SrTiO$_3$ heterostructure is studied within a quarter-filled $t_{2g}$-orbital Hubbard model on a square lattice. We argue that the ground state is ferromagnetic driven by the double exchange mechanism, and is orbitally and charge ordered due to a confined geometry and electron correlations. The orbital and charge density waves open gaps on the entire Fermi surfaces of all orbitals. The theory explains the observed insulating behavior of the $p$-type interface between LaVO$_3$ and SrTiO$_3$.