Orbital-selective altermagnetism and correlation-enhanced spin-splitting in transition metal oxides

TL;DR

This paper explores altermagnetic properties in strongly-correlated transition metal oxides, revealing orbital-selective altermagnetism and correlation-enhanced spin-splitting through first-principles calculations.

Contribution

It demonstrates orbital-selective altermagnetism in Ca2RuO4 and shows how Coulomb interactions enhance spin-splitting in these materials.

Findings

Orbital-selective altermagnetism in Ca2RuO4.

Altermagnetism present in YVO3 across magnetic orders.

Coulomb repulsion enhances non-relativistic spin-splitting.

Abstract

We investigate the altermagnetic properties of strongly-correlated transition metal oxides considering the family of the quasi two-dimensional A2BO4 and three-dimensional ABO3. As a test study, we analyze the Mott insulators Ca2RuO4 and YVO3. In both cases, the orbital physics is extremely relevant in the t2g subsector with the presence of an orbital-selective Mott physics in the first case and of a robust orbital-order in the second case. Using first-principles calculations, we show the presence of an orbital-selective altermagnetism in the case of Ca2RuO4. In the case of YVO3, we study the altermagnetism as a function of the magnetic ordering and of the Coulomb repulsion U. We find that the altermagnetism is present in all magnetic orders with the symmetries of the Brillouin zone depending on the magnetic order. Finally, the Coulomb repulsion enhances the non-relativistic spin-splitting making the strongly-correlated systems an exciting playground for the study of the altermagnetism.