Spin-State Transition and Metal-Insulator Transition in La${}_{1-x}$Eu${}_x$CoO${}_3$}

Abstract

We present a study of the structure, the electric resistivity, the magnetic susceptibility, and the thermal expansion of La${}_{1-x}$Eu${}_x$CoO${}_3$. LaCoO${}_3$ shows a temperature-induced spin-state transition around 100 K and a metal-insulator transition around 500 K. Partial substitution of La${}^{3+}$ by the smaller Eu${}^{3+}$ causes chemical pressure and leads to a drastic increase of the spin gap from about 190 K in LaCoO${}_3$ to about 2000 K in EuCoO${}_3$, so that the spin-state transition is shifted to much higher temperatures. A combined analysis of thermal expansion and susceptibility gives evidence that the spin-state transition has to be attributed to a population of an intermediate-spin state with orbital order for $x<0.5$ and without orbital order for larger $x$. In contrast to the spin-state transition, the metal-insulator transition is shifted only moderately to higher temperatures with increasing Eu content, showing that the metal-insulator transition occurs independently from the spin-state distribution of the Co${}^{3+}$ ions. Around the metal-insulator transition the magnetic susceptibility shows a similar increase for all $x$ and approaches a doping-independent value around 1000 K indicating that well above the metal-insulator transition the same spin state is approached for all $x$.

10 pages, 6 figures