The PSI Center for Neutron and Muon Sciences uses neutrons and muons to explore and understand matter and materials.
Lab News & Scientific Highlights
Continuum Excitations in a Spin Supersolid on a Triangular Lattice
Magnetic, thermodynamic, neutron diffraction and inelastic neutron scattering are used to study spin correlations in the easy-axis XXZ triangular lattice magnet K2Co(SeO3)2. Despite the presence of quasi-2D “supersolid” magnetic order, the low-energy excitation spectrum contains no sharp modes and is instead a broad and structured multiparticle continuum. Applying a weak magnetic field ...
Reentrant multiple-q magnetic order and a “spin meta-cholesteric” phase in Sr3Fe2O7
Topologically nontrivial magnetic structures such as skyrmion lattices are well known in materials lacking lattice inversion symmetry, where antisymmetric exchange interactions are allowed. Only recently, topological multi-q magnetic textures that spontaneously break the chiral symmetry, for example, three-dimensional hedgehog lattices, were discovered in centrosymmetric compounds, where they are instead driven by frustrated interactions. Here we show that ...
Ferromagnetic quantum critical point protected by nonsymmorphic symmetry in a Kondo metal
Quantum critical points (QCPs), zero-temperature phase transitions, are win- dows to fundamental quantum-mechanical phenomena associated with universal behaviour. Magnetic QCPs have been extensively investigated in the vicinity of antiferromagnetic order. However, QCPs are rare in metallic ferromagnets due to the coupling of the order parameter to electronic soft modes. Recently, antisymmetric spin-orbit coupling in noncentrosymmetric systems was suggested to protect ferromagnetic QCPs. Nonetheless, multiple centrosymmetric materials ...
The Zuoz school’s 26th edition
26th Zuoz Summer School on particle physics took place at the Lyceum Alpinum with close to 100 participants.
Quantum Spin Dynamics Due to Strong Kitaev Interactions in the Triangular-Lattice Antiferromagnet CsCeSe2
The extraordinary properties of the Kitaev model have motivated an intense search for new physics in materials that combine geometrical and bond frustration. In this Letter, we employ inelastic neutron scattering, spin wave theory, and exact diagonalization to study the spin dynamics in the perfect triangular-lattice antiferromagnet (TLAF) CsCeSe2. This material orders into a stripe phase, which is demonstrated to arise as a consequence of the off-diagonal bond-dependent terms in the spin Hamiltonian ...
Evidence for time-reversal symmetry-breaking kagome superconductivity
Superconductivity and magnetism are often antagonistic in quantum matter, although their intertwining has long been considered in frustrated-lattice systems. Here we utilize scanning tunnelling microscopy and muon spin resonance to demonstrate time-reversal symmetry-breaking superconductivity in kagome metal Cs(V, Ta)3Sb5, where the Cooper pairing exhibits magnetism and is modulated by it. In the magnetic channel, we observe spontaneous internal magnetism ...
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Recent CNM publications
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Karathanassis IK, Heidari-Koochi M, Koukouvinis F, Weiss L, Trtik P, Spivey D, et al.
Quantification of cavitating flows with neutron imaging
Scientific Reports. 2024; 14: 26911 (17 pp.). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-76588-3
DORA PSI -
Mukharjee PK, Shen B, Erdmann S, Jesche A, Kaiser J, Baral PR, et al.
Intermediate field-induced phase of the honeycomb magnet BaCo2(AsO4)2
Physical Review B. 2024; 110(14): L140407 (6 pp.). https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.110.L140407
DORA PSI -
Zhu M, Romerio V, Steiger N, Nabi S D, Murai N, Ohira-Kawamura S, et al.
Continuum excitations in a spin supersolid on a triangular lattice
Physical Review Letters. 2024; 133(18): 186704 (6 pp.). https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.133.186704
DORA PSI