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Solitonic lattice and Yukawa forces in the rare-earth orthoferrite TbFeO3

Nature Materials volume 11, pages 694–699 (2012)Cite this article

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Abstract

The random fluctuations of spins give rise to many interesting physical phenomena, such as the ‘order-from-disorder’ arising in frustrated magnets and unconventional Cooper pairing in magnetic superconductors. Here we show that the exchange of spin waves between extended topological defects, such as domain walls, can result in novel magnetic states. We report the discovery of an unusual incommensurate phase in the orthoferrite TbFeO3 using neutron diffraction under an applied magnetic field. The magnetic modulation has a very long period of 340 Å at 3 K and exhibits an anomalously large number of higher-order harmonics. These domain walls are formed by Ising-like Tb spins. They interact by exchanging magnons propagating through the Fe magnetic sublattice. The resulting force between the domain walls has a rather long range that determines the period of the incommensurate state and is analogous to the pion-mediated Yukawa interaction between protons and neutrons in nuclei.

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Figure 1: Uniform magnetic phases of TbFeO3.
Figure 2: Single-crystal neutron diffraction data.
Figure 3: Magnetic phase diagram of TbFeO3.
Figure 4: Theoretical phase diagram and the structure of the IC state.
Figure 5: Topological defects in the coupled orders of Tb and Fe spins.

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Acknowledgements

D.N.A. and S.L. thank the Deutsche Forschung Gemeinschaft for support under contract AR 613/2-1. The neutron scattering work was supported by the Danish National Research Council through DANSCATT. N.P.J. thanks J. B. Hansen, for support and guidance. M.M. was supported by the FOM grant 08.0952.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials, University of Groningen, Nijenborgh 4, Groningen, 9747 AG, The Netherlands

    Sergey Artyukhin & Maxim Mostovoy

  2. Department of Energy Conversion and Storage, Danish Technical University, Risø Campus, Frederiksborgvej 399, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark

    Niels Paduraru Jensen & Luise Theil Kuhn

  3. Helmholtz–Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie, Hahn-Meitner Platz 1, D-14109 Berlin, Germany

    Duc Le, Karel Prokes, Vinícius G. de Paula, Heloisa N. Bordallo, Andrey Maljuk, Sven Landsgesell, Hanjo Ryll, Bastian Klemke, Sebastian Paeckel, Klaus Kiefer & Dimitri N. Argyriou

  4. Instituto de Física, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ 20559-900, Brazil

    Vinícius G. de Paula

  5. Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark

    Heloisa N. Bordallo & Kim Lefmann

  6. European Spallation Source ESS AB, SE-221 00 Lund, PO Box 176, Sweden

    Dimitri N. Argyriou

  7. Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research Dresden, Helmholtzstrasse 20, 01069 Dresden, Germany

    Andrey Maljuk

  8. Department of Synchrotron Radiation Research, Lund University, Lund, Box 118, Sweden

    Dimitri N. Argyriou

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  1. Sergey Artyukhin
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Contributions

D.N.A. initiated the project, D.N.A. and M.M. interpreted the results and wrote the paper, and M.M. and S.A. developed the theory. N.P.J. and H.N.B. contributed to the interpretation of the experimental results. K.L. and L.T.K. supported the project. Neutron experiments and analysis of these data were conducted by N.P.J., D.N.A., K.P., D.L., V.G.P. and H.N.B. Bulk property and characterization measurements were conducted by S.L., H.R., B.K., S.P. and K.K., and A.M. grew the single crystal. All authors commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Dimitri N. Argyriou.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Artyukhin, S., Mostovoy, M., Jensen, N. et al. Solitonic lattice and Yukawa forces in the rare-earth orthoferrite TbFeO3. Nature Mater 11, 694–699 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3358

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