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Scientists solve riddle of strangely behaving magnetic material

Date:
June 21, 2013
Source:
DOE/Ames Laboratory
Summary:
Materials scientists have found an accurate way to explain the magnetic properties of a lanthanum-cobalt-oxygen compound that has mystified the scientific community for decades.
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Materials scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Ames Laboratory have found an accurate way to explain the magnetic properties of a compound that has mystified the scientific community for decades.

The compound of lanthanum, cobalt and oxygen (LaCoO3) has been a puzzle for over 50 years, due to its strange behavior. While most materials tend to lose magnetism at higher temperatures, pure LaCoO3 is a non-magnetic semiconductor at low temperatures, but as the temperature is raised, it becomes magnetic. With the addition of strontium on the La sites the magnetic properties become even more prominent until, at 18 percent strontium, the compound becomes metallic and ferromagnetic, like iron.

"They knew that we could calculate x-ray absorption and magnetic dichroism, so we started doing that. It is a case where we fell into doing what we thought was a routine calculation, and it turned out we discovered a totally different explanation," said Harmon. "We found we could explain pretty much everything in really nice detail, but without explicitly invoking that local model," said Harmon.

The scientists found that a small rhombohedral distortion of the LaCoO3 lattice structure, which had largely been ignored, was key.

"We found that the total electronic energy of the lattice depends sensitively on that distortion," explained Harmon. "If the distortion becomes smaller (the crystal moves closer to becoming cubic), the magnetic state of the crystal switches from non-magnetic to a state with 1.3 Bohr magnetons per Co atom."

Ames Laboratory scientists Bruce Harmon and Yongbin Lee partnered with the researchers at the Argonne National Laboratory and the University of California, Santa Cruz to publish a paper in Physical Review Letters, "Evolution of Magnetic Oxygen States in Sr-Doped LaCO3."

This new understanding may help the further development of these materials, which are easily reduced to nanoparticles; these are finding use in catalytic oxidation and reduction reactions associated with regulation of noxious emissions from motor vehicles.

The research is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science through the Ames Laboratory.


Story Source:

Materials provided by DOE/Ames Laboratory. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. S. Medling, Y. Lee, H. Zheng, J. F. Mitchell, J. W. Freeland, B. N. Harmon, F. Bridges. Evolution of Magnetic Oxygen States in Sr-Doped LaCoO_{3}. Physical Review Letters, 2012; 109 (15) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.109.157204

Cite This Page:

DOE/Ames Laboratory. "Scientists solve riddle of strangely behaving magnetic material." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 21 June 2013. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/06/130621121018.htm>.
DOE/Ames Laboratory. (2013, June 21). Scientists solve riddle of strangely behaving magnetic material. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 28, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/06/130621121018.htm
DOE/Ames Laboratory. "Scientists solve riddle of strangely behaving magnetic material." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/06/130621121018.htm (accessed March 28, 2024).

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