Low-temperature muon spin rotation studies of the monopole charges and currents in Y doped Ho2Ti2O7

In the ground state of Ho2Ti2O7 spin ice, the disorder of the magnetic moments follows the same rules as the proton disorder in water ice. Excitations take the form of magnetic monopoles that interact via a magnetic Coulomb interaction. Muon spin rotation has been used to probe the low-temperature magnetic behaviour in single crystal Ho2−xYxTi2O7 (x = 0, 0.1, 1, 1.6 and 2). At very low temperatures, a linear field dependence for the relaxation rate of the muon precession λ(B), that in some previous experiments on Dy2Ti2O7 spin ice has been associated with monopole currents, is observed in samples with x = 0, and 0.1. A signal from the magnetic fields penetrating into the silver sample plate due to the magnetization of the crystals is observed for all the samples containing Ho allowing us to study the unusual magnetic dynamics of Y doped spin ice

Coexistence of the long-range and short-range magnetic order components in SrEr(2)O(4)

Single crystal neutron diffraction reveals two distinct components to the magnetic ordering in geometrically frustrated SrEr$_2$O$_4$. One component is a long-range ordered ${\bf k}=0$ structure which appears below $T_N = 0.75$ K. Another component is a short-range incommensurate structure which manifests itself by the presence of a strong diffuse scattering signal. On cooling from higher temperatures down to 0.06 K, the partially ordered component does not undergo a pronounced phase transition. The magnetic moments in the long-range commensurate and short-range incommensurate structures are predominantly pointing along the [001] and [100] axes respectively. The unusual coexistence of two magnetic structures is probed using both unpolarised and XYZ-polarised neutron scattering techniques. The observed diffuse scattering pattern can be satisfactorily reproduced with a classical Monte Carlo simulation by using a simple model based on a ladder of triangles.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure