2015/04/30 by Tadataka Watanabe, Shota Takita, Keisuke Tomiyasu +1
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Condensed Matter Physics #Condensed matter physics #Frustration #Lattice (music) #Materials science #Multiferroics and related materials #Phase transition #Physics #Physics of Superconductivity and Magnetism #Spin (aerodynamics) #Spin states #Spinel #Thermodynamics #cond-mat.mtrl-sci #cond-mat.str-el
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevb.92.174420
published as Phys. Rev. B 92, 174420 (2015) · 7 pages, 3 figures
arxiv created 2015/10/16 · openalex publication_date 2015/11/24 · arxiv updated 2015/11/26 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Ultrasound velocity measurements were performed on a single crystal of spin-frustrated ferrite spinel ZnFe2O4 from 300 K down to 2 K. In this cubic crystal, all the symmetrically independent elastic moduli exhibit softening with a characteristic minimum with decreasing temperature below \ensuremath∼100 K. This elastic anomaly suggests a coupling between dynamical lattice deformations and molecular-spin excitations. In contrast, the elastic anomalies, normally driven by the magnetostructural phase transition and its precursor, are absent in ZnFe2O4, suggesting that the spin-lattice coupling cannot play a role in relieving frustration within this compound. The present study infers that, for ZnFe2O4, the dynamical molecular-spin state evolves at low temperatures without undergoing precursor spin-lattice fluctuations and spin-lattice ordering. It is expected that ZnFe2O4 provides the unique dynamical spin-lattice liquidlike system, where not only the spin molecules but also the cubic lattice fluctuate spatially and temporally.