Hierarchical excitations from correlated spin tetrahedra on the breathing pyrochlore lattice

Abstract

The hierarchy of the coupling strengths in a physical system often engenders an effective model at low energies where the decoupled high-energy modes are integrated out. Here, using neutron scattering, we show that the spin excitations in the breathing pyrochlore lattice compound CuInCr${}_4$S${}_8$ are hierarchical and can be approximated by an effective model of correlated tetrahedra at low energies. At higher energies, intra-tetrahedron excitations together with strong magnon-phonon couplings are observed, which suggests the possible role of the lattice degree of freedom in stabilizing the spin tetrahedra. Our work illustrates the spin dynamics in CuInCr${}_4$S${}_8$ and demonstrates a general effective-cluster approach to understand the dynamics on the breathing-type lattices.

11 pages, 9 figures

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Cited by in corpus (4)

• Complex magnetic phase diagram with a small phase pocket in a three-dimensional frustrated magnet CuInCr${}_4$S${}_8$
• Beyond Single Tetrahedron Physics of Breathing Pyrochlore Compound Ba3Yb2Zn5O11
• Breathing pyrochlore magnet CuGaCr${}_4$S${}_8$: Magnetic, thermodynamic, and dielectric properties
• Spin dynamics in the skyrmion-host lacunar spinel GaV4S8