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

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 text...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: K. J. A. Franke, P. R. Dean, M. Ciomaga Hatnean, M. T. Birch, D. D. Khalyavin, P. Manuel, T. Lancaster, G. Balakrishnan, P. D. Hatton
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: AIP Publishing LLC 2019-12-01
Series:AIP Advances
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.5129400
Description
Summary: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.
ISSN:2158-3226