Frustrated Magnetic Cycloidal Structure and Emergent Potts Nematicity in CaMn${}_2$P${}_2$

Abstract

We report neutron-diffraction results on single-crystal CaMn${}_2$P${}_2$ containing corrugated Mn honeycomb layers and determine its ground-state magnetic structure. The diffraction patterns consist of prominent (1/6, 1/6, $L$) reciprocal lattice unit (r.l.u.; $L$ = integer) magnetic Bragg reflections, whose temperature-dependent intensities are consistent with a first-order antiferromagnetic phase transition at the Néel temperature $T_{\mathrm{N}}=70(1)$ K. Our analysis of the diffraction patterns reveals an in-plane $6\times 6$ magnetic unit cell with ordered spins that in the principal-axis directions rotate by 60-degree steps between nearest neighbors on each sublattice that forms the honeycomb structure, consistent with the $P_{A}c$ magnetic space group. We find that a few other magnetic subgroup symmetries ($P_{A}2/c$, $P_{C}2/m$, $P_S\bar{1},P_{C}2,P_{C}m,P_{S}1$) of the paramagnetic $P\bar{3}m11^{\prime }$ crystal symmetry are consistent with the observed diffraction pattern. We relate our findings to frustrated $J_1$-$J_2$-$J_3$ Heisenberg honeycomb antiferromagnets with single-ion anisotropy and the emergence of Potts nematicity

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Cited by in corpus (4)

• Linear magnetoelectricity in the Zintl phase pnictides (Ba, Ca, Sr)${\mathrm{Mn}}_2{(\mathrm{P},\mathrm{As},\mathrm{Sb})}_2$ from first principles calculations
• Three-state Potts nematic order in stacked frustrated spin models with SO(3) symmetry
• Magnetic Order and Strain in Hexagonal Manganese Pnictide CaMn${}_2$Bi${}_2$
• Orbital selective order and ${\mathbb{Z}}_3$ Potts nematicity from a non-Fermi liquid