588 research outputs found
Uniaxial pressure dependencies of the phase transitions in GdMnO
GdMnO shows an incommensurate antiferromagnetic order below
K, transforms into a canted A-type antiferromagnet below K, and for
finite magnetic fields along the b axis ferroelectric order occurs below
K. From high-resolution thermal expansion measurements along all
three principal axes, we determine the uniaxial pressure dependencies of the
various transition temperatures and discuss their correlation to changes of the
magnetic exchange couplings in MnO ().Comment: 2 pages, 3 figures, submitted to JMMM (Proceedings of ICM'06, Kyoto
Multiferroicity and colossal magneto-capacitance in Cr-thiospinels
The sulfur based Cr-spinels RCr2S4 with R = Cd and Hg exhibit the coexistence
of ferromagnetic and ferroelectric properties together with a pronounced
magnetocapacitive coupling. While in CdCr2S4 purely ferromagnetic order is
established, in HgCr2S4 a bond-frustrated magnetic ground state is realized,
which, however, easily can be driven towards a ferromagnetic configuration in
weak magnetic fields. This paper shall review our recent investigation for both
compounds. Besides the characterization of the magnetic properties, the complex
dielectric permittivity was studied by means of broadband dielectric
spectroscopy as well as measurements of polarization hysteresis and
pyro-currents. The observed colossal magneto-capacitive effect at the magnetic
transition seems to be driven by an enormous variation of the relaxation
dynamics.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figure
Multiferroic behavior in CdCr2X4 (X = S, Se)
The recently discovered multiferroic material CdCr2S4 shows a coexistence of
ferromagnetism and relaxor ferroelectricity together with a colossal
magnetocapacitive effect. The complex dielectric permittivity of this compound
and of the structurally related CdCr2Se4 was studied by means of broadband
dielectric spectroscopy using different electrode materials. The observed
magnetocapacitive coupling at the magnetic transition is driven by enormous
changes of the relaxation dynamics induced by the development of magnetic
order
Colossal magnetocapacitance and colossal magnetoresistance in HgCr2S4
We present a detailed study of the dielectric and charge transport properties
of the antiferromagnetic cubic spinel HgCr2S4. Similar to the findings in
ferromagnetic CdCr2S4, the dielectric constant of HgCr2S4 becomes strongly
enhanced in the region below 60 - 80 K, which can be ascribed to polar
relaxational dynamics triggered by the onset of ferromagnetic correlations. In
addition, the observation of polarization hysteresis curves indicates the
development of ferroelectric order below about 70 K. Moreover, our
investigations in external magnetic fields up to 5 T reveal the simultaneous
occurrence of magnetocapacitance and magnetoresistance of truly colossal
magnitudes in this material.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Spin-phonon coupling in antiferromagnetic chromium spinels
The temperature dependence of eigenfrequencies and intensities of the IR
active modes has been investigated for the antiferromagnetic chromium spinel
compounds CdCr2O4, ZnCr2O4, ZnCr2S4, ZnCr2Se4, and HgCr2S4 by IR spectroscopy
for temperatures from 5 K to 300 K. At the transition into the magnetically
ordered phases, and driven by spin-phonon coupling, most compounds reveal
significant splittings of the phonon modes. This is true for geometrically
frustrated CdCr2O4, and ZnCr2O4, for bond frustrated ZnCr2S4 and for ZnCr2Se4,
which also is bond frustrated, but dominated by ferromagnetic exchange. The
pattern of splitting is different for the different compounds and crucially
depends on the nature of frustration and of the resulting spin order. HgCr2S4,
which is almost ferromagnetic, exhibits no splitting of the eigenfrequencies,
but shows significant shifts due to ferromagnetic spin fluctuations.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figure
Dielectric properties of charge ordered LuFe2O4 revisited: The apparent influence of contacts
We show results of broadband dielectric measurements on the charge ordered,
proposed to be mul- tiferroic material LuFe2O4. The temperature and frequency
dependence of the complex permittivity as investigated for temperatures above
and below the charge-oder transition near T_CO ~ 320 K and for frequencies up
to 1 GHz can be well described by a standard equivalent-circuit model
considering Maxwell-Wagner-type contacts and hopping induced AC-conductivity.
No pronounced contribution of intrinsic dipolar polarization could be found and
thus the ferroelectric character of the charge order in LuFe2O4 has to be
questioned.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Critical slowing down near the multiferroic phase transition in MnWO
By using broadband dielectric spectroscopy in the radiofrequency and
microwave range we studied the magnetoelectric dynamics in the multiferroic
chiral antiferromagnet MnWO. Above the multiferroic phase transition at
K we observe a critical slowing down of the corresponding
magnetoelectric fluctuations resembling the soft-mode behavior in canonical
ferroelectrics. This electric field driven excitation carries much less
spectral weight than ordinary phonon modes. Also the critical slowing down of
this mode scales with an exponent larger than one which is expected for
magnetic second order phase transition scenarios. Therefore the investigated
dynamics have to be interpreted as the softening of an electrically active
magnetic excitation, an electromagnon.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, appendi
Context-dependent detection of fungal parasites in four ant species
The reaction between the allyl radical (C3H5Ë™) and acetylene (C2H2) in a heated microtubular reactor has been studied at the VUV beamline of the Swiss Light Source. The reaction products are sampled from the reactor and identified by their photoion mass-selected threshold photoelectron spectra (ms-TPES) by means of imaging photoelectron photoion coincidence spectroscopy. Cyclopentadiene is identified as the sole reaction product by comparison of the measured photoelectron spectrum with that of cyclopentadiene. With the help of quantum-chemical computations of the C5H7 potential energy surface, the C2H2 + C3H5Ë™ association reaction is confirmed to be the rate determining step, after which H-elimination to form C5H6 is prompt in the absence of re-thermalization at low pressures. The formation of cyclopentadiene as the sole product from the allyl + acetylene reaction offers a direct path to the formation of cyclic hydrocarbons under combustion relevant conditions. Subsequent reactions of cyclopentadiene may lead to the formation of the smallest polycyclic aromatic molecule, naphthalene
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