Elementary excitations in the cyclic molecular nanomagnet Cr8

TL;DR

This paper uses neutron scattering data to analyze low-energy excitations in the Cr8 molecular nanomagnet, confirming the existence and nature of specific spin excitation bands in a bipartite antiferromagnetic ring.

Contribution

It provides a detailed spectroscopic confirmation of the L-band and E-band excitations and clarifies their physical significance in the Cr8 molecular ring.

Findings

Confirmation of the L-band as the lowest rotational excitation

Identification of the E-band as spin wave excitations

Insights into the physical nature of low-lying excitations

Abstract

Combining recent and new inelastic neutron scattering data for the molecular cyclic cluster Cr8 produces a deep understanding of the low lying excitations in bipartite antiferromagnetic Heisenberg rings. The existence of the L-band, the lowest rotational band, and the E-band, essentially spin wave excitations, is confirmed spectroscopically. The different significance of these excitations and their physical nature is clearly established by high-energy and Q-dependence data.