Spin gap in quasi-one-dimensional S=3/2 antiferromagnet CoTi2O5

Quasi-one-dimensional(1D)antiferromagnets are known to display intriguing phenomena especially when there is a spin gap in their spin-excitation spectra.Here we demonstrate that a spin gap exists in the quasi-1D Heisenberg antiferromagnet CoTi2O5 with highly ordered Co2+/Ti4+occupation,in which the Co2+ions with S=3/2 form a 1D spin chain along the a-axis.CoTi2O5 undergoes an antiferromagnetic transition at TN~24 K and exhibits obvious anisotropic magnetic susceptibility even in the paramagnetic region.Although a gapless magnetic ground state is usually expected in a quasi-1D Heisenberg antiferromagnet with half-integer spins,by analyzing the specific heat,the thermal conductivity,and the spin-lattice relaxation rate(1/T1)as a function of temperature,we found that a spin gap is opened in the spin-excitation spectrum of CoTi2O5 around TN,manifested by the rapid decrease of magnetic specific heat to zero,the double-peak characteristic in thermal conductivity,and the exponential decay of 1/T1 below TN.Both the magnetic measurements and the first-principles calculations results indicate that there is spin-orbit coupling in CoTi2O5,which induces the magnetic anisotropy in CoTi2O5,and then opens the spin gap at low temperature.

Metal-Insulator Transition in Ca-Doped Sr14-xCaxCu24O41 Systems Probed by Thermopower Measurements

High quality Sr14-xCaxCu24O41 single-crystals are successfully grown by floating-zone technique, and the trans- port properties are studied. The temperature dependence of resistivity along the c-axis direction is semiconductor- like for x ≤ 10 and it can be fitted by the thermal activation equation p = po exp（ △ /kBT） with kB being the Boltzmann constant and A the activation energy. A break in the slope of thermopower （S） versus the inverse temperature （1 IT） corresponding to the formation of charge-density waves （CD W） is first observed for x ≤ 6. The temperature dependence of thermopower becomes metallic for x ≥ 8 while the resistivity is still semiconductorlike. We propose that the insulation behaviour of the resistivity in the Ca doping range 8 ≤ x ≤ 11 could result from the localization of the charge carriers due to the disorder induced by Ca doping and a revised electronic phase diagram is derived based on our observations.

Low-temperature heat transport of spin-gapped quantum magnets

This article reviews low-temperature heat transport studies of spin-gapped quantum magnets in the last few decades. Quantum magnets with small spins and low dimensionality exhibit a variety of novel phenomena. Among them, some systems are characteristic of having quantum-mechanism spin gap in their magnetic excitation spectra, including spin-Peierls systems, S=1Haldane chains, S= 1/2 spin ladders, and spin dimmers. In some particular spin-gapped systems, the XY-type antiferromagnetic state induced by magnetic field that closes the spin gap can be described as a magnon Bose-Einstein condensation(BEC). Heat transport is effective in probing the magnetic excitations and magnetic phase transitions, and has been extensively studied for the spin-gapped systems. A large and ballistic spin thermal conductivity was observed in the two-leg Heisenberg S=1/2 ladder compounds. The characteristic of magnetic thermal transport of the Haldane chain systems is quite controversial on both the theoretical and experimental results. For the spin-Peierls system, the spin excitations can also act as heat carriers. In spin-dimer compounds, the magnetic excitations mainly play a role of scattering phonons. The magnetic excitations in the magnon BEC systems displayed dual roles, carrying heat or scattering phonons, in different materials.