Pressure-Temperature phase diagram of multiferroic EuTiO$_3$

Abstract

The structural transformation of multiferroic EuTiO$_3$ has been intensively investigated by synchrotron x-ray diffraction at pressures up to 50.3 GPa and temperatures from 50 to 500 K. An antiferrodistortive phase transition from cubic Pm-3m to tetragonal I4/mcm space group has been observed, identical to the one that has been previously explored at ambient pressure and low temperatures. Several compression/decompression cycles at different temperatures have been carried out to accurately map the transition, and as a result a P-T phase diagram for EuTiO$_3$ has been constructed. The observed phase transition exhibits many similarities with isostructural SrTiO$_3$, although the absence of magnetoelectric interactions in the latter accounts for the different phase boundaries between the two materials.