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Effect of the Non-Magnetic Ion Doping on the Magnetic Behavior of MgCr2O4

Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Geometrically frustrated magnets exhibit exotic excitations due to competing interactions between spins. The spinel compound MgCr2O4, a three-dimensional Heisenberg antiferromagnet, hosts both spin-wave and spin-resonance modes, but the origin of its resonant excitations remains debated. Suppressing magnetic order via non-magnetic doping can help isolate these modes in neutron scattering studies. We synthesized Ga3+ and Cd2+-doped MgCr2O4 via solid-state reaction and analyzed their structure and magnetism. Ga3+ doping (0–20%) causes anomalous lattice shrinkage due to site disorder from Ga3+ occupying both Mg2+ and Cr3+ sites. Magnetically, Ga3+ doping drives the system from the antiferromagnetic order to a spin-glass state, fully suppressing magnetic ordering at 20% doping. In contrast, Cd2+ replaces only Mg2+, expanding the lattice and meantime inducing strong spin-glass behavior. At 10% Cd2+, long-range antiferromagnetic order is entirely suppressed. Thus, 10% Cd-doped MgCr2O4 offers an ideal platform to study the resonant magnetic excitations without any spin-wave interference.
Source: Magnetism
DOI: 10.3390/magnetism5030019
Authors: Fuxi Zhou, Zheng He, Donger Cheng, Han Ge, Wenjing Zhang, Xiao Wang, Pengfei Zhou, Wanju Luo, Zhengdong Fu, Xinzhi Liu, Liusuo Wu, Lunhua He, Yanchun Zhao, Erxi Feng
Institutions: Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou University of Technology, China Spallation Neutron Source, Institute of High Energy Physics, Sun Yat-sen University, Southern University of Science and Technology, Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory, Institute of Physics
Language: English
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $1,207
OpenAlex ID: W4413719220
FWCI: 0.969
Cites: 46
Cited by: 3
Related to: 10