No Arabic abstract
This paper is aiming to review some of the neutron scattering studies performed on URu2Si2 in Grenoble. This compound has been studied for a quarter of century because of a so-called hidden order ground state visible by most of the bulk experiments but almost invisible by microscopic probes like neutrons, muons NMR or x-ray. We stress on some aspects that were not addressed previously. Firstly, the comparison of the cell parameters in the 1-2-2 systems seems to point that the magnetic properties of URu2Si2 are leading by an U4+ electronic state. Secondly, a compilation of the different studies of the tiny antiferromagnetic moment indicates that the tiny antiferromagnetic moment has a constant value which may indicate that it is not necessary extrinsic. We also present the last development on the magnetic form factor measurement in which the magnetic density rotates when entering in the hidden order state. To end, the thermal dependence of the two most intense magnetic excitation at Q0=(1,0,0) and Q1=(0.6,0,0) seems to indicate two different origins or processes for these excitations.
We have made extensive reciprocal space maps in the heavy-fermion superconductor URu2Si2 using high-resolution time-of-flight single-crystal neutron diffraction to search for signs of a hidden order parameter related to the 17.5 K phase transition. Within the present sensitivity of the experiment (0.007 uB/U-ion for sharp peaks), no additional features such as incommensurate structures or short-range order have been found in the (h0l) or (hhl) scattering planes. The only additional low-temperature scattering observed was the well-known tiny antiferromagnetic moment of 0.03 uB/U-ion.
Several non-cuprates layered transition-metal oxides exhibit clear evidence for stripe ordering of charges and magnetic moments. Therefore, stripe order should be considered as the typical consequence of doping a Mott insulator, but only in cuprates stripe order or fluctuating stripes coexist with metallic properties. A linear relationship between the charge concentration and the incommensurate structural and magnetic modulations can be considered as the finger print of stripe ordering with localized degrees of freedom. In nickelates and in cobaltates with K2NiF4 structure, doping suppresses the nearest-neighbor antiferromagnetism and induces stripe order. The higher amount of doping needed to induce stripe phases in these non-cuprates series can be attributed to reduced charge mobility. Also manganites exhibit clear evidence for stripe phases with further enhanced complexity, because orbital degrees of freedom are involved. Orbital ordering is the key element of stripe order in manganites since it is associated with the strongest structural distortion and with the perfectly fulfilled relation between doping and incommensurability. Magnetic excitations in insulating stripe phases exhibit strong similarity with those in the cuprates, but only for sufficiently short magnetic correlation lengths reflecting well-defined magnetic stripes that are only loosely coupled.
Neutron scattering can provide detailed information about the energy and momentum dependence of the magnetic dynamics of materials provided sufficiently large single crystals are available. This requirement has limited the number of rare earth high temperature superconducting materials that have been studied in any detail. However, improvements in crystal growth in recent years has resulted in considerable progress in our understanding of the behaviour of the magnetism of the CuO planes in both the superconducting and normal state. This review will focus primarily on the spin fluctuations in La_{2-x}Sr_{x}CuO_{4} and YBa_{2}Cu_{3}O_{7-x} since these are the two systems for which the most detailed results are available. Although gaps in our understanding remain, there is now a consistent picture of on the spin fluctuation spectra in both systems as well as the changes induced by the superconducting transition. For both La_{2-x}Sr_{x}CuO_{4} and underdoped YBa_{2}Cu_{3}O_{7-x} the normal state response is characterised by incommensurate magnetic fluctuations. The low energy excitations are suppressed by the superconducting transition with a corresponding enhancement in the response at higher energies. For YBa_{2}Cu_{3}O_{7-x} the superconducting state is accompanied by the rapid development of a commensurate resonant response whose energy varies with T_{c}. In underdoped samples this resonance persists above T_{c}.
As a simple cubic system with only one f electron per cerium ion, CeB6 is of model character to investigate the interplay of orbital phenomena with magnetism. It is also a textbook example of a compound that exhibits magnetically hidden order -- a low-temperature magnetic phase with ordered quadrupolar moments. It is difficult to identify the symmetry of such hidden-order states in common x-ray or neutron scattering experiments, as there is no signal in zero field, however alternative techniques like neutron diffraction in external field, resonant x-ray scattering, or ultrasonic investigations can be applied. Another possible method for characterizing hidden order is to look at the magnetic excitation spectrum, which carries the imprint of the multipolar interactions and the hidden order parameter in its dispersion relations. Using a specific candidate model, the dispersion is calculated and then compared to that measured with inelastic neutron scattering. Until recently, only a limited amount of data which show the presence of dispersing excitations measured along a few high-symmetry directions in an applied magnetic field were available. Early attempts to compare such calculations with experiments showed that only strongest modes at high-symmetry points could be identified. The present review of the most recent neutron-scattering results is intended to satisfy the need of more accurate inelastic neutron-scattering experiments as a function of field and temperature, giving us the opportunity to identify existing excitation branches in CeB6 and conclusively compare them with the theoretically predicted multipolar excitations.
We use neutron scattering to study the Pr$^{3+}$ crystalline electric field (CEF) excitations in the filled skutterudite PrOs$_4$As$_{12}$. By comparing the observed levels and their strengths under neutron excitation with the theoretical spectrum and neutron excitation intensities, we identify the Pr$^{3+}$ CEF levels, and show that the ground state is a magnetic $Gamma_4^{(2)}$ triplet, and the excited states $Gamma_1$, $Gamma_4^{(1)}$ and $Gamma_{23}$ are at 0.4, 13 and 23 meV, respectively. A comparison of the observed CEF levels in PrOs$_4$As$_{12}$ with the heavy fermion superconductor PrOs$_4$Sb$_{12}$ reveals the microscopic origin of the differences in the ground states of these two filled skutterudites.