Design of magnetic spirals in layered perovskites: Extending the stability range far beyond room temperature

Tian Shang*, Emmanuel Canévet, Mickaël Morin, Denis Sheptyakov, María Teresa Fernández-Díaz, Ekaterina Pomjakushina, Marisa Medarde

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

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Abstract

In insulating materials with ordered magnetic spiral phases, ferroelectricity can emerge owing to the breaking of inversion symmetry. This property is of both fundamental and practical interest, particularly with a view to exploiting it in low-power electronic devices. Advances toward technological applications have been hindered, however, by the relatively low ordering temperatures Tspiral of most magnetic spiral phases, which rarely exceed 100 K. We have recently established that the ordering temperature of a magnetic spiral can be increased up to 310 K by the introduction of chemical disorder. Here, we explore the design space opened up by this novel mechanism by combining it with a targeted lattice control of some magnetic interactions. In Cu-Fe layered perovskites, we obtain Tspiral values close to 400 K, comfortably far from room temperature and almost 100 K higher than using chemical disorder alone. Moreover, we reveal a linear relationship between the spiral's wave vector and the onset temperature of the spiral phase. This linear law ends at a paramagnetic-collinear-spiral triple point, which defines the highest spiral ordering temperature that can be achieved in this class of materials. On the basis of these findings, we propose a general set of rules for designing magnetic spirals in layered perovskites using external pressure, chemical substitutions, and/or epitaxial strain, which should guide future efforts to engineer magnetic spiral phases with ordering temperatures suitable for technological applications.

Original languageEnglish
Article numberaau6386
JournalScience Advances
Volume4
Issue number10
Number of pages11
ISSN2375-2548
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2018

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