17O NMR evidence for orbital dependent ferromagnetic correlations in Sr2RuO4

We probed spin correlations in Ru 4d(xy) and 4d(yz,zx) orbitals separately in the unconventional metallic state of Sr2RuO4 by O-17 NMR. We establish that spin correlations are orbital dependent, and only the Ru 4d(xy) spin susceptibility chi(xy) increases significantly with decreasing temperature prior to the crossover to the canonical Fermi liquid state at T-FL = 25 K. The temperature dependence of O-17 and Ru-101 nuclear spin-lattice relaxation rates (17,101)1/T-1 uncovers interplay between the growth ferromagnetic spin fluctuations and anomalous charge transport properties.