Spin Stripe Order in a Square Planar Trilayer Nickelate

Published

June 18, 2019

Author(s)

Junjie Zhang, D. M. Pajerowski, A. S. Botana, Hong Zheng, Leland Harriger, Jose Rodriguez Rivera, J. Ruff, N. J. Schreiber, B. Wang, Yu-Sheng Chen, Wangchun Chen, M. R. Norman, S. Rosenkranz, J. F. Mitchell, D. Phelan

Abstract

Trilayer nickelates, which exhibit a high degree of orbital polarization combined with an electron (d^8.67) corresponding to overdoped cuprates, have been recognized as promising candidates for achieving high-T_c superconductivity. One such material, La₄Ni₃O₈, undergoes a semiconductor-insulator transition at 105 K, which was recently shown to arise from the formation of charge stripes, but a longstanding issue has been the origin of an anomaly in the magnetic susceptibility at the transition and whether it signifies formation of spin stripes akin to single layer nickelates. Here, we report single crystal neutron diffraction measurements (both polarized and unpolarized) that establish that the ground state is indeed magnetic. The ordering is modeled as antiferromagnetic spin stripes that are commensurate with the charge stripes, the magnetic ordering occurring in individual trilayers that are uncorrelated along the crystallographic c-axis. Comparison of the charge and spin stripe order parameters reveals that, in contrast to single-layer nickelates such as La_2-xSr_xNiO₄ as well as the majority of oxides including manganites, cobalates, and cuprates, these orders simultaneously appear, thus demonstrating a stronger coupling between spin and charge.

Citation

Physical Review Letters

Volume

122

Issue

24

Pub Type

Journals

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Keywords

Neutron Scattering, Nickelates, Superconductivity, Charge Stripe Order, Spin Stripe Order

Citation

Zhang, J. , Pajerowski, D. , Botana, A. , Zheng, H. , Harriger, L. , Rodriguez Rivera, J. , Ruff, J. , Schreiber, N. , Wang, B. , Chen, Y. , Chen, W. , Norman, M. , Rosenkranz, S. , Mitchell, J. and Phelan, D. (2019), Spin Stripe Order in a Square Planar Trilayer Nickelate, Physical Review Letters, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=924566 (Accessed October 30, 2025)