Complex magnetism in Eu₃Sn₂S₇

Understanding the interplay between magnetism and the underlying lattice is critical for searching for new magnetic materials with exotic properties. Over the past few decades, considerable interest has been focused on the so-called geometrically frustrated magnets which was proposed to host exotic phases such as quantum spin liquid[1]. Recently, it was suggested that irregular pentagonal lattice could be a potential platform for studying geometric frustration [2]. Here, we report our recent single crystal growth of Eu₃Sn₂S₇ with a potential pentagonal lattice[3]. We conduct comprehensive measurements of the temperature-dependent magnetic susceptibility, and uncovered two successive magnetic transition at temperatures below 6K. The system exhibits an easy-axis magnetic anisotropy along the c-axis, and manifests two metamagnetic transition at 1.8 K with an applied field along the c-axis. In particular, we observed a plateau in the field-dependent magnetization corresponding to 1/6 of the saturated moment. This plateau in the magnetization may indicate the presence of an unusual magnetic state between 0.5 and 2 T.



Reference

[1] L. Savary, and L. Balents, Rep. Prog. Phys. 80, 016502 (2016).

[2] E. Ressouche, V. Simonet, B. Canals, M. Gospodinov, and V. Skumryev, Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 267204 (2009).

[3] Par S. Jaulmes and M. Julien-Pouzol, Acta Cryst. B33, 3898-3899 (1977).