A comparative study on magnetic order and field-induced magnetic transition in double perovskite iridates: RE2ZnIrO6and RE2MgIrO6(RE = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd)

Yuxia Gao; Zhaoming Tian; Longmeng Xu; Malik Ashtar; Zongtang Wan; Zhengcai Xia; Feng Yang; Songliu Yuan; Yuyan Han; Wei Tong

doi:10.1088/1361-648X/aba71e

A comparative study on magnetic order and field-induced magnetic transition in double perovskite iridates: RE₂ZnIrO₆and RE₂MgIrO₆(RE = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd)

J Phys Condens Matter. 2020 Aug 19;32(46). doi: 10.1088/1361-648X/aba71e.

Authors

Yuxia Gao^{1

2}, Zhaoming Tian^{1

2}, Longmeng Xu^{1

2}, Malik Ashtar^{1

2}, Zongtang Wan^{1

2}, Zhengcai Xia^{1

2}, Feng Yang^{1

2}, Songliu Yuan^{1

2}, Yuyan Han³, Wei Tong³

Affiliations

¹ School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, People's Republic of China.
² Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, People's Republic of China.
³ Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Condensed Matter Physics at Extreme Conditions, High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Chinese Academy of Science, Hefei, 230031, People's Republic of China.

PMID: 32679575
DOI: 10.1088/1361-648X/aba71e

Abstract

We perform a comparative magnetic study on two series of rare-earth (RE) based double perovskite iridates RE₂BIrO₆(RE = Pr, Nd, Sm-Gd; B = Zn, Mg), which show Mott insulating state with tunable charge energy gap from ∼330 meV to ∼560 meV by changing RE cations. For nonmagnetic RE = Eu cations, Eu₂MgIrO₆shows antiferromagnetic (AFM) order and field-induced spin-flop transitions below Néel temperature (T_N) in comparison with the ferromagnetic (FM)-like behaviors of Eu₂ZnIrO₆at low temperatures. For magnetic-moment-containing RE ions, Gd₂BIrO₆show contrasting magnetic behaviors with FM-like transition (B = Zn) and AFM order (B = Mg), respectively. While, for RE = Pr, Nd and Sm ions, all members show AFM ground state and field-induced spin-flop transitions belowT_Nirrespective of B = Zn or Mg cations. Moreover, two successive field-induced metamagnetic transitions are observed for RE₂ZnIrO₆(RE = Pr, Nd) in high field up to 56 T, the resultant field temperature (H-T) phase diagrams are constructed. The diverse magnetic behaviors in RE₂BIrO₆reveal that the 4f-Ir exchange interactions between the RE and Ir sublattices can mediate their magnetism.

Keywords: Mott insulator; antiferromagnetic; ferromagnetic; spin flop.