Ambient temperature high-pressure-induced ferroelectric phase transition in CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$

TL;DR

This study investigates the pressure-induced ferroelectric to paraelectric phase transition in CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$ at ambient temperature, revealing a structural change around 7 GPa and analyzing its nature through various spectroscopic and diffraction techniques.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed high-pressure analysis of CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$'s phase transition, identifying the transition pressure and characterizing the structural and spectroscopic changes involved.

Findings

CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$ undergoes a phase transition at ~7 GPa.

The transition is second order with no volume change.

The transition temperature decreases with pressure at -48 K/GPa.

Abstract

The ferroelectric to paraelectric phase transition of multiferroic CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$ has been investigated at high pressures and ambient temperature by second harmonic generation (SHG), Raman spectroscopy, and powder and single-crystal x-ray diffraction. We have found that CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$ undergoes a pressure-induced structural phase transition ($P4_2mc \rightarrow P4_2/nmc$) at $\sim$7 GPa to the same paraelectric structure found at ambient pressure and $T_c$ = 630 K. The continuous linear decrease of the SHG intensity that disappears at 7 GPa and the existence of a Raman active mode at 244 cm$^{-1}$ that first softens up to 7 GPa and then hardens with pressure, are used to discuss the nature of the phase transition of CaMnTi$_2$O$_6$ for which a d$T_c$/d$P = -48$ K/GPa has been found. Neither a volume contraction nor a change of the normalized pressure on the eulerian strain are observed across the phase transition with all the unit-cell volume data following a second order Birch-Murnaghan equation of state with a bulk modulus of $B_0$ = 182.95(2) GPa.