Neutron diffraction, magnetization and ESR studies of pseudocubic Nd(0.75)Ba(0.25)MnO3 and its unusual critical behavior above Tc

Results of structural neutron diffraction study, magnetization and ESR measure-ments are presented for insulating Nd0.75Ba0.25MnO3, Tc = 129 K. The crystal structure is refined in the range 4.2-300 K. The compound is found to exhibit the Jahn-Teller (JT) transition at 250 K. The field cooled (FC) magnetization data are in a reasonable agreement with the predictions for a 3D isotropic ferromagnet above Tc. However, these measurements reveal a difference between the FC and zero FC data in the paramagnetic region. ESR results are also in a correspondence with behavior of a cubic ferromagnet above T* = 143 K. It is shown that an anisotropic exchange coupling of the Mn and Nd magnetic moments can give a substantial contribution in ESR linewidth masking its critical enhan-cement. The different temperature treatments of the sample reveal a temperature hysteresis of the ESR spectra below T* indicating an anomalous response in the paramagnetic region. The study of phase transition in this manganite suggests change in its character from the second to first order at T*. The conventional free energy including the magnetization and magnetic field is not found to describe the first order transition. This suggests that the charge, orbital and JT phonon degrees of freedom, in addition to magnetization, may be the critical variables, the unusual character of the transition being determined by their coupling. Unconventional critical behavior is attributed to orbital liquid metallic phase that coexists with the initial orbital ordered phase below T*.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Low-temperature kinetics of exciton-exciton annihilation of weakly localized one-dimensional Frenkel excitons

We present results of numerical simulations of the kinetics of exciton-exciton annihilation of weakly localized one-dimensional Frenkel excitons at low temperatures. We find that the kinetics is represented by two well-distinguished components: a fast short-time decay and a very slow long-time tail. The former arises from excitons that initially reside in states belonging to the same localization segment of the chain, while the slow component is caused by excitons created on different localization segments. We show that the usual bi-molecular theory fails in the description of the behavior found. We also present a qualitative analytical explanation of the non-exponential behavior observed in both the short- and the long-time decay components.Comment: Published in J. Chem. Phys. 114, 1 April (2001

Giant oscillations of energy levels in mesoscopic superconductors

The interplay of geometrical and Andreev quantization in mesoscopic superconductors leads to giant mesoscopic oscillations of energy levels as functions of the Fermi momentum and/or sample size. Quantization rules are formulated for closed quasiparticle trajectories in the presence of normal scattering at the sample boundaries. Two generic examples of mesoscopic systems are studied: (i) one dimensional Andreev states in a quantum box, (ii) a single vortex in a mesoscopic cylinder.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure