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Ferroelectricity induced by acentric spin-density waves in YMn2O5

L. C. Chapon, P. G. Radaelli, G. R. Blake, S. Park, S-W. Cheong

cond-mat.mtrl-sciarXiv:cond-mat/0511174

Abstract

The commensurate and incommensurate magnetic structures of the magnetoelectric system YMn2O5, as determined from neutron diffraction, were found to be spin-density waves lacking a global center of symmetry. We propose a model, based on a simple magneto-elastic coupling to the lattice, which enables us to predict the polarization based entirely on the observed magnetic structure. Our data accurately reproduce the temperature-dependence of the spontaneous polarization, in particular its sign reversal at the commensurate-incommensurate transition.

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