Glassy behavior in the ferromagnetic and the non-magnetic insulating states of the rare earth manganates, Ln0.7Ba0.3MnO3 (Ln = Nd or Gd)

TL;DR

This study investigates the glassy magnetic behavior in insulating states of Ln0.7Ba0.3MnO3 manganates, revealing cluster glass and spin glass phenomena linked to disorder and cation size mismatch.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the magnetic glassy states in rare earth manganates, highlighting differences between Nd and Gd variants and their underlying disorder effects.

Findings

Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 exhibits cluster glass behavior below 150 K.

Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 shows spin glass dynamics below 36 K.

Disorder from A-site cation size mismatch influences glassy magnetic states.

Abstract

While La0.7Ba0.3MnO3 is a ferromagnetic metal (TC = 340 K) with longrange ordering, Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 shows a transition around 150 K with a small increase in magnetization, but remains an insulator at all temperatures. Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 is non-magnetic and insulating at all temperatures. Low field dc magnetization and ac susceptibility measurements reveal the presence of a transition at around 150 K in Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3, and a complex behavior with different ordering/freezing transitions at 62, 46 and 36 K in the case of Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3, the last one being more prominent. The nature of the field dependence of the magnetization, combined with the slow magnetic relaxation, ageing and memory effects, suggests that Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 is a cluster glass below 150 K, a situation similar to that found for La_{1-x}SrxCoO3. Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3, however, shows non-equilibrium dynamics characteristic of spin glasses, below 36 K. The difference in nature of the glassy behavior between Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 and Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 probably arises because of the larger disorder arising from the mismatch between the sizes of the A-site cations in the former. Our results on Nd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 and Gd0.7Ba0.3MnO3 suggest that the magnetic insulating states often reported for rare earth manganates of the type Ln1-xAxMnO3 (Ln = rare earth, A = alkaline earth) are likely to be associated with glassy magnetic behavior.