Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Trump, B A
• Koohpayeh, S M
• Livi, K J T
• Wen, J-J
• Arpino, K E
• Ramasse, Q M
• Brydson, R
• Feygenson, M
• Takeda, H
• Takigawa, M
• Kimura, K
• Nakatsuji, S
• Broholm, C L
• McQueen, T M

Titel

Universal geometric frustration in pyrochlores

Ist Teil von

• Nature communications, 2018-07, Vol.9 (1), p.2619-10, Article 2619

Ort / Verlag

England: Nature Publishing Group

Erscheinungsjahr

2018

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Materials with the pyrochlore/fluorite structure have diverse technological applications, from magnetism to nuclear waste disposal. Here we report the observation of structural instability present in the pyrochlores A Zr O O' (A = Pr, La) and Yb Ti O O', that exists despite ideal stoichiometry, ideal cation-ordering, the absence of lone pair effects, and a lack of magnetic order. Though these materials appear to have good long-range order, local structure probes find displacements, of the order of 0.01 nm, within the pyrochlore framework. The pattern of displacements of the A O' sublattice mimics the entropically-driven fluxional motions characteristic of and well-known in the silica mineral β-cristobalite. The universality of such displacements within the pyrochlore structure adds to the known structural diversity and explains the extreme sensitivity to composition found in quantum spin ices and the lack of ferroelectric behavior in pyrochlores.