Abstract
Long wavelength vibrational modes in the ferromagnetic semiconductor are investigated using time resolved x-ray diffraction. At room temperature, we measure oscillations in the x-ray diffraction intensity corresponding to coherent vibrational modes with well-defined wavelengths. When the correlation of magnetic impurities sets in, we observe the transition of the lattice into a disordered state that does not support coherent modes at large wavelengths. Our measurements point toward a magnetically induced broadening of long wavelength vibrational modes in momentum space and their quasilocalization in the real space. More specifically, long wavelength vibrational modes cannot be assigned to a single wavelength but rather should be represented as a superposition of plane waves with different wavelengths. Our findings have strong implications for the phonon-related processes, especially carrier-phonon and phonon-phonon scattering, which govern the electrical conductivity and thermal management of semiconductor-based devices.
- Received 18 June 2017
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.105501
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