Tailoring magnetic frustration in strained epitaxial FeRh films

Ralf Witte, Robert Kruk, Markus E. Gruner, Richard A. Brand, Di Wang, Sabine Schlabach, Andre Beck, Virgil Provenzano, Rossitza Pentcheva, Heiko Wende, and Horst Hahn
Phys. Rev. B 93, 104416 – Published 16 March 2016
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Abstract

We report on a strain-induced martensitic transformation, accompanied by a suppression of magnetic order in epitaxial films of chemically disordered FeRh. X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and electronic structure calculations reveal that the lowering of symmetry (from cubic to tetragonal) imposed by the epitaxial relation leads to a further, unexpected, tetragonal-to-orthorhombic transition, triggered by a band-Jahn-Teller-type lattice instability. The collapse of magnetic order is a direct consequence of this structural change, which upsets the subtle balance between ferromagnetic nearest-neighbor interactions arising from Fe-Rh hybridization and frustrated antiferromagnetic coupling among localized Fe moments at larger distances.

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  • Received 23 December 2015
  • Revised 16 February 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.93.104416

©2016 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Ralf Witte1,*, Robert Kruk1, Markus E. Gruner2,3, Richard A. Brand1,2, Di Wang1,4, Sabine Schlabach4,5, Andre Beck6, Virgil Provenzano7,8, Rossitza Pentcheva2, Heiko Wende2, and Horst Hahn1,9

  • 1Institute of Nanotechnology, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany
  • 2Faculty of Physics and Center for Nanointegration Duisburg-Essen (CENIDE), University of Duisburg-Essen, 47048 Duisburg, Germany
  • 3Forschungs-Neutronenquelle Heinz Maier-Leibnitz (FRM II), Technische Universität München, 85748 Garching, Germany
  • 4Karlsruhe Nano Micro Facility (KNMF), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany
  • 5Institute for Applied Materials, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany
  • 6Institute for Solid State Physics, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany
  • 7Materials Science and Engineering Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, Maryland 20899, USA
  • 8Institute for Magnetics Research, George Washington University, Washington DC 20052, USA
  • 9KIT-TUD-Joint Research Laboratory Nanomaterials, Technical University Darmstadt, 64287 Darmstadt, Germany

  • *ralf.witte@kit.edu

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Issue

Vol. 93, Iss. 10 — 1 March 2016

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