Direct observation of topological magnon polarons in a multiferroic material

Abstract

Magnon polarons are novel elementary excitations possessing hybrid magnonic and phononic signatures, and are responsible for many exotic spintronic and magnonic phenomena. Despite long-term sustained experimental efforts in chasing for magnon polarons, direct spectroscopic evidence of their existence is hardly observed. Here, we report the direct observation of magnon polarons using neutron spectroscopy on a multiferroic Fe${}_2$Mo${}_3$O${}_8$ possessing strong magnon-phonon coupling. Specifically, below the magnetic ordering temperature, a gap opens at the nominal intersection of the original magnon and phonon bands, leading to two separated magnon-polaron bands. Each of the bands undergoes mixing, interconverting and reversing between its magnonic and phononic components. We attribute the formation of magnon polarons to the strong magnon-phonon coupling induced by Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. Intriguingly, we find that the band-inverted magnon polarons are topologically nontrivial. These results uncover exotic elementary excitations arising from the magnon-phonon coupling, and offer a new route to topological states by considering hybridizations between different types of fundamental excitations.

11 pages, 5 figures, published in Nature Communications

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• Topological magnon-polarons in honeycomb antiferromagnets with spin-flop transition
• Optical magnetoelectric effect in the polar honeycomb antiferromagnet Fe2Mo3O8
• Large Thermal Hall Effect in MnPS${}_3$
• Chiral magnon-polaron edge states in Heisenberg-Kitaev magnets
• Topological magnon-polaron transport in a bilayer van der Waals magnet
• Spin and lattice dynamics of a van der Waals antiferromagnet MnPSe${}_3$
• Einstein-de Haas effect: a bridge linking mechanics, magnetism, and topology
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• High-throughput search for topological magnon materials
• Topological Magnetic Phases and Magnon-Phonon Hybridization in the Presence of Strong Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya Interaction
• Magnetic Interactions in the Polar Ferrimagnet with a Bipartite Structure
• Chiral Phonons Arising From Chirality-Selective Magnon-Phonon Coupling