MAGNETIC EXCITATIONS AND PHASE-TRANSITION OF CSFEBR3 IN AN EXTERNAL MAGNETIC-FIELD

In CSFeBr3 the Fe2+ ion with effective spin one has locally a singlet ground state (m=0). The antiferromagnetic interactions between neighbouring Fe-ions are too weak as compared with the anisotropy constant to introduce long range order in the absence of an external field. By inelastic neutron scattering we studied the magnetic excitations in an external magnetic field up to 5 Tesla applied along the c-axis. A linear Zeeman splitting was observed with a Landé factor g=2.4. The field renormalizes the dispersion curves in such a way that the exchange interaction has decreasing influence with increasing field. Theoretical calculations according to the excitonic model of Lindgård describe the experimental results very well. At 4.1 Tesla a phase transition appears to a commensurate long range order with a 120° arrangement of the spins in the hexagonal plane. Within the limits of experimental observation this phase transition has no influence on the dynamical behaviour. No critical phenomena could be observed. The dynamical structure factor |Gj(ℚ)|2 of the lower Zeeman split modes decreases with increasing field. © 1990 Springer-Verlag.