A very fundamental and unconventional characteristic of superconductivity in iron-based materials is that it occurs in the vicinity of {it two} other instabilities. Apart from a tendency towards magnetic order, these Fe-based systems have a propensit
y for nematic ordering: a lowering of the rotational symmetry while time-reversal invariance is preserved. Setting the stage for superconductivity, it is heavily debated whether the nematic symmetry breaking is driven by lattice, orbital or spin degrees of freedom. Here we report a very clear splitting of NMR resonance lines in FeSe at $T_{nem}$ = 91K, far above superconducting $T_c$ of 9.3 K. The splitting occurs for magnetic fields perpendicular to the Fe-planes and has the temperature dependence of a Landau-type order-parameter. Spin-lattice relaxation rates are not affected at $T_{nem}$, which unequivocally establishes orbital degrees of freedom as driving the nematic order. We demonstrate that superconductivity competes with the emerging nematicity.
139La NMR and relaxation measurements have been performed on La{1.8-x}Eu{0.2}Sr{x}CuO{4} (x = 0.13 and 0.2) single crystals. The temperature dependence of the 139La NMR spectra in all the structural phases (HTT -> LTO -> LTT) reveals the non-vanishin
g tilt angle of the CuO6 octahedra in the HTT phase, opposed to the case of La{2-x}Sr{x}CuO{4} where the tilt angle disappears immediately above the transition. Since 139La relaxation data provide evidence of the thermodynamic critical fluctuations associated with the structural phase transitions, HTT -> LTO and LTO -> LTT, we conclude that the structural transitions in Eu-doped La{2-x}Sr{x}CuO{4} should be of the order-disorder type rather than of the displacive type observed in La{2-x}Sr{x}CuO{4}. The change of the nature of the structural transitions caused by doping Eu appears to be consistent with the LTO -> LTT transition that is absent in La{2-x}Sr{x}CuO{4}.
Epitaxial (001) BiFeO3 thin films grown on vicinal SrTiO3 substrates are under large anisotropic stress from the substrates. The variations of the crystallographic tilt angle and the c lattice constant, caused by the lattice mismatch, along the film
thickness were analyzed quantitatively using the X-ray diffraction technique. By generalizing the Nagai model, we estimated how step bunching resulted in the vertical lattice mismatch between adjacent BiFeO3 layers, which induced the strain relaxation and crystallographic tilt. The step bunching was confirmed by the increased terrace width on the BiFeO3 surface.
We describe the directional growth of ferroelectric domains in a multiferroic BiFeO3 thin film, which was grown epitaxially on a vicinal (001) SrTiO3 substrate. A detailed structural analysis of the film shows that a strain gradient, which can create
a symmetry breaking in a ferroelectric double well potential, causes ferroelectric domains to grow with preferred directionality under the influence of an electric field. Our results suggest the possibility of controlling the direction of domain growth with an electric field by imposing constraints on ferroelectric films, such as a strain gradient.
We report $^{51}$V zero-field NMR of manganese vanadate spinel of MnV$_2$O$_4$, together with both ac and dc magnetization measurements. The field and temperature dependence of ac susceptibilities show a reentrant-spin-glass-like behavior below the f
errimagnetic(FEM) ordering temperature. The zero-field NMR spectrum consists of multiple lines ranging from 240 MHz to 320 MHz. Its temperature dependence reveals that the ground state is given by the simultaneous formation of a long-range FEM order and a short-range order component. We attribute the spin-glass-like anomalies to freezing and fluctuations of the short-range ordered state caused by the competition between spin and orbital ordering of the V site.
