2014/12/15 by Harald O. Jeschke, Francesc Salvat-Pujol, Elena Gati +5 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.str-el
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevb.92.094417
published as Phys. Rev. B 92, 094417 (2015) · 5 pages, 6 figures
arxiv created 2014/12/15 · arxiv updated 2015/09/16
We investigate the structural, electronic and magnetic properties of the newly synthesized mineral barlowite Cu4(OH)6FBr which contains Cu2+ ions in a perfect kagome arrangement. In contrast to the spin-liquid candidate herbertsmithite ZnCu3(OH)6Cl2, kagome layers in barlowite are perfectly aligned due to the different bonding environments adopted by F- and Br- compared to Cl-. We perform density functional theory calculations to obtain the Heisenberg Hamiltonian parameters of Cu4(OH)6FBr which has a Cu2+ site coupling the kagome layers. The 3D network of exchange couplings together with a substantial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya coupling lead to canted antiferromagnetic ordering of this compound at TN=15 K as observed by magnetic susceptibility measurements on single crystals.