XtremeD – a new neutron diffractometer for high pressures and magnetic fields at ILL developed by Spain

4 páginas, 1 figura.-- et al.Neutron diffraction has unique capabilities for scientific research under extreme conditions, mainly in two large areas: crystallography/geosciences and magnetism/solid-state physics. The growing interest in these fields is attested by the quantity and quality of publications, by the number of experiments proposed at the different neutron sources and by the new instrumentation projects under development all around the world. Therefore, the Spanish scientific community and the ILL are considering the construction of a CRG "eXtreme conditions Diffractometer (XtremeD)" for both single crystals and powders, operating at high pressures (up to 50 GPa) and high magnetic fields (up to 15 Tesla). At the present time we are working on the finalization of the technical project, and the construction phase is expected to start in 2011. The scientific areas in which the projected instrument can make significant contributions and the main technical characteristics of the project are discussed in this paper.Peer reviewe

Study of the transformation sequence on a high temperature martensitic transformation Ni-Mn-Ga-Co shape memory alloy

Ni-Mn-Ga alloys show the highest magnetic-field-induced strain among ferromagnetic shape memory alloys. A great effort is being done in this alloy system to increase the application temperature range. In this sense, the addition of small amounts of Cobalt to NiMnGa alloys has been proved to increase the MT temperatures through the increase of the electron per atom relation (e/a). In this work, the analysis of the crystal structure of the present phases and the phase transformations has been performed on a Ni-Mn-Ga-Co alloy by neutron diffraction measurements from 10 K to 673 K. The study has been completed by means of calorimetric and magnetic measurements. On cooling the alloy undergoes a martensitic transformation from a face centered cubic structure to a nonmodulated tetragonal martensite. The appearance of intermartensite transformations can be disregarded in the whole temperature range below the martensitic transformation. However, a jump in the unit-cell volume of the tetragonal martensite has been observed at 325 K. Since this temperature is close to the Curie temperature of the alloy both, the structural and magnetic contributions are taken into account to explain the results

Structural effects of Sc doping on the multiferroic TbMnO3

9 páginas, 8 figuras, 4 tablas.-- PACS number(s): 75.85.+t, 61.05.cp, 61.05.fm, 61.05.cjThe new TbMn1−xScxO3 series has been synthesized and the structural properties have been characterized by x-ray diffraction, neutron diffraction, and x-ray absorption spectroscopy. The whole series belongs to the family of ABO3 perovskites. All of the samples are isostructural to the parent compound TbMnO3, crystallizing in an orthorhombic cell with space-group Pbnm symmetry. The homovalent substitution of Mn3+ with the larger Sc3+ ion leads to an increase in both the unit-cell volume and the BO6 octahedra tilting. The analysis of neutron and x-ray diffraction patterns suggest a continuous evolution from a Jahn-Teller distorted BO6 octahedron in TbMnO3 into a nearly regular one in TbScO3. However, x-ray absorption measurements at the Mn K edge reveal that the local geometry around the Mn3+ cation remains distorted in the series even for high values of x. This result is in opposition to previous findings in similar compounds such as LaMn1−x(Ga/Sc)xO3 and suggests that the strong orthorhombic distortion of the unit cell due to the small Tb3+ cation size favors the stability of the distorted MnO6 octahedron in diluted systems. Long-range magnetic ordering is not found for x≥0.3 samples and there is not sign of ferromagnetism for x=0.5 in opposite to the behavior observed in the La-based compounds. Since Sc substitution induces a minor perturbation on the local structure of the Mn sublattice but magnetic ordering of both Mn and Tb sublattices disappear for a small degree of substitution, we conclude that the involved magnetic interactions should have a strong directional anisotropy and the Tb magnetic ordering strongly depends on the existence of a long-range coherent Mn ordering.Financially supported by the Spanish MICINN (Projects No. FIS08-03951 and No. MAT2007-61621) and DGA (Camrads).Peer reviewe

Magnetically-induced ferroelectricity in the (ND4)2[FeCl5(D2O)] molecular compound

The number of magnetoelectric multiferroic materials reported to date is scarce, as magnetic structures that break inversion symmetry and induce an improper ferroelectric polarization typically arise through subtle competition between different magnetic interactions. The (NH 4) 2 [FeCl 5 (H 2 O)] compound is a rare case where such improper ferroelectricity has been observed in a molecular material. We have used single crystal and powder neutron diffraction to obtain detailed solutions for the crystal and magnetic structures of (NH4)2[FeCl5(H2O)], from which we determined the mechanism of multiferroicity. From the crystal structure analysis, we observed an order-disorder phase transition related to the ordering of the ammonium counterion. We have determined the magnetic structure below T N, at 2 €‰K and zero magnetic field, which corresponds to a cycloidal spin arrangement with magnetic moments contained in the ac-plane, propagating parallel to the c-axis. The observed ferroelectricity can be explained, from the obtained magnetic structure, via the inverse Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya mechanism.Partial funding for this work is provided by the Ministerio Español de Ciencia e Innovación through projects MAT2010-16981, MAT2011-27233-C02-02. JARV acknowledges CSIC for a JAEdoc contract.Peer Reviewe

Cation distribution of cobalt ferrite electrosynthesized nanoparticles: A methodological comparison

Final publication at http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jallcom.2017.12.342, © 2017 Elsevier B.V.The present work seeks to analyse the structural and magnetic properties of cobalt ferrite nanoparticles obtained by electrochemical synthesis by high-resolution transmission electronic microscopy (HRTEM), X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), Mössbauer spectroscopy (MS), neutron diffraction (ND) and SQUID magnetometer. The cationic distribution is analyzed by different techniques. The inversion degree determined by the most accurate measurements was 0.73(1), and the formula for the nanoparticles therefore was (↑Co 0.27 Fe 0.73 )[↓Co 0.73 Fe 1.27 ]O 4 . The magnetic moment found from DC and Mössbauer spectroscopy measurements was 3.8(3) μB, and the coercivity was 7870 Oe at 100 K.This work is supported by the MINECO/FEDER Project MAT2015-67557-C2-2-

Evidence of large magneto-dielectric effect coupled to a metamagnetic transition in Yb2CoMnO6

The double perovskite Yb2CoMnO6 has been synthesized with an almost perfect checkerboard arrangement of Co2+ and Mn4+ cations in the B-sublattice of the perovskite cell. It presents an anomaly in the electric capacitance and a strong magneto-dielectric effect at about 40 K whose interplay with the microscopic magnetic behavior has been investigated by means of neutron diffraction, magnetization, pyroelectric, and relative dielectric permittivity measurements. We show that the onset of an E-type antiferromagnetic ordering of Co2+ and Mn4+ moments monitored by neutron diffraction provokes the noticeable jump of the relative dielectric permittivity (∼9%) at about 40 K. It is also shown that this jump can be totally suppressed by application of a magnetic field of μ0H = 5 T. Neutron experiments and magnetic measurements confirm that such a suppression leading to a significant magneto-dielectric effect is driven by a metamagnetic phase transition from the peculiar E-type ordering of 3d moments into a collinear ferromagnetic order. Pyroelectric current measurements do not show any spontaneous electric polarization, so the large dielectric anomaly at zero field cannot be ascribed to a ferroelectric ordering.We thank financial support from the Spanish MINECO (Project Nos. MAT2012-38213-C02-01 and MAT2012-38213-C02-02, cofunded by ERDF from EU) and Diputacion General de Aragon (DGA-CAMRADS). One of us (J.A.R.-V.) acknowledges CSIC for a JAEdoc contract.Peer Reviewe

Magnetoelectric and structural properties of Y2CoMnO6: The role of antisite defects

We have carried out an investigation on the magnetoelectric properties of the presumed multiferroic Y2CoMnO6 with different degrees of Co/Mn atomic ordering. The magnetic ground state was studied by neutron diffraction, showing a collinear ferromagnetic (FM) ordering of Co and Mn moments with a small antiferromagnetic canting. No superstructure peaks from an E-type magnetic structure were detected in our measurements. Magnetic measurements reveal FM transitions with pinned magnetic domains. The degree of Co/Mn ordering affects the Curie temperature only a little, but has strong effects on the magnetic hysteresis loops, and the FM moment signal at high field increases with increasing such order. The loops display steps at critical fields whose number and extent depends on each specimen. The most ordered sample exhibits the greatest steps ascribed to the alignment of magnetic domains separated by antiphase boundaries. All samples are insulators exhibiting low dielectric loss and dielectric constants at low temperature. On warming, they show a step increase in the real dielectric permittivity accompanied by peaks in the dielectric loss typical of thermally activated hopping processes. At room temperature, the huge values of the dielectric constant reveal the presence of Maxwell-Wagner depletion layers. Pyroelectric measurements reveal a high polarization at low temperature for these compounds that increases with increasing the Co/Mn ordering. There is no correlation between the magnetic transition and the onset of pyroelectric current. No significant changes are observed in the pyroelectric effect measured under an external magnetic field, so magnetoelectric coupling is negligible. This paper identifies the pyroelectric current as thermally stimulated depolarization current ascribed to the reorientation of defect dipoles with activation energy of about 0.05 eV. Therefore, no ferroelectric transition occurs in these compounds, discarding the existence of intrinsic magnetoelectric multiferroicity.For financial support we thank the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO) (Projects No. MAT2012-38213-C02-01 and -02 and No. MAT2015-68760-C1-1 and -2-P, cofunded by the European Regional Development Fund [ERDF] from the European Union) and Diputación General de Aragón (DGA, project E-69). J.A. Rodríguez-Velamazan acknowledges CSIC for the JAEdoc contract.Peer Reviewe

Helical spin dynamics in commensurate magnets: A study on brochantite, Cu 4 SO 4 ( OH ) 6

We report the direct observation of a commensurate-ordered antiferromagnetic (AFM) state but incommensurate helical spin dynamics in the natural mineral brochantite Cu4SO4(OH)6 through neutron diffraction and neutron spectroscopy measurements. Inelastic neutron scattering measurements reveal magnonlike excitations with considerable dispersion along the c axis and almost flat branches in other principal directions, indicating the strong one-dimensional character of the magnetic correlations. We experimentally observe the effect of the uniform Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM) interaction, which elevates the degeneracy of the spin-wave modes, shifting them in opposite directions in reciprocal space. The system has a commensurate AFM ground state, stabilized by the anisotropic symmetric Heisenberg exchange interactions, and quasi-one-dimensional chiral spin dynamics due to the antisymmetric DM interaction. Employing linear spin-wave theory, we were able to construct an effective Heisenberg Hamiltonian. We quantify both the symmetric exchange parameters and the DM vector components in Cu4SO4(OH)6 and determine the mechanism of the magnetic frustration. Our work provides detailed insights into the complex dynamics of the spin chain in the presence of uniform DM interaction