Investigating the magnetic ground state of the skyrmion host material Cu2OSeO3 using long-wavelength neutron diffraction

Franke, K.J.A.; Dean, P.R.; Hatnean, M. Ciomaga; Birch, M.T.; Khalyavin, D.D.; Manuel, P.; Lancaster, T.; Balakrishnan, G.; Hatton, P.D.

doi:10.1063/1.5129400

Investigating the magnetic ground state of the skyrmion host material Cu2OSeO3 using long-wavelength neutron diffraction

Franke, K.J.A.; Dean, P.R.; Hatnean, M. Ciomaga; Birch, M.T.; Khalyavin, D.D.; Manuel, P.; Lancaster, T.; Balakrishnan, G.; Hatton, P.D.

Authors

K.J.A. Franke

P.R. Dean

M. Ciomaga Hatnean

M.T. Birch

D.D. Khalyavin

P. Manuel

Professor Tom Lancaster tom.lancaster@durham.ac.uk
Professor

G. Balakrishnan

P.D. Hatton

Abstract

We present long-wavelength neutron diffraction data measured on both single crystal and polycrystalline samples of the skyrmion host material Cu2OSeO3. We observe magnetic satellites around the (01⎯⎯1) diffraction peak not accessible to other techniques, and distinguish helical from conical spin textures in reciprocal space. Our measurements show that not only the field-polarised phase but also the helical ground state are made up of ferrimagnetic clusters instead of individual spins. These clusters are distorted Cu tetrahedra, where the spin on one Cu ion is anti-aligned with the spin on the three other Cu ions.

Citation

Franke, K., Dean, P., Hatnean, M. C., Birch, M., Khalyavin, D., Manuel, P., …Hatton, P. (2019). Investigating the magnetic ground state of the skyrmion host material Cu2OSeO3 using long-wavelength neutron diffraction. AIP Advances, 9(12), Article 125228. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5129400

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Nov 18, 2019
Online Publication Date	Dec 23, 2019
Publication Date	Dec 23, 2019
Deposit Date	Jan 6, 2020
Publicly Available Date	Jan 8, 2020
Journal	AIP Advances
Publisher	American Institute of Physics
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	9
Issue	12
Article Number	125228
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5129400

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© Author(s) 2019. All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).