Eur. Phys. J. B 64, 27-34 (2008)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2008-00277-7

Crystal and magnetic structure of CeVO₃

¹ Max-Planck-Institut für Festkörperforschung, 70569 Stuttgart, Germany
² Hahn-Meitner-Institut, Glienicker Strasse 100, 14109 Berlin, Germany
³ SNBL at ESRF, BP 220, 38042 Grenoble Cedex 9, France
⁴ Laboratory of Crystallography, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, BSP-Dorigny, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
⁵ Department of Applied Physics, University of Tokyo, 113, Tokyo, Japan
⁶ Correlated Electron Research Center (CERC), National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, 305-8562, Japan

Corresponding author: ^a reehuis@hmi.de

Received: 13 September 2007
Revised: 23 April 2008
Published online: 16 July 2008

Abstract

The crystal structure and the magnetic ordering pattern of the electrically insulating perovskite CeVO₃ was investigated by high-resolution powder X-ray diffraction and single-crystal neutron diffraction. A structural phase transition from an orthorhombic to a monoclinic structure (with space groups Pbnm and P2₁/b, respectively) was observed upon cooling below T_S = 136 K. This transition is associated with a strong distortion of the VO₆-octahedra and can be attributed to orbital ordering. A magnetic ordering transition driven by exchange interactions between vanadium moments is observed at T_N = 124 K, and antiferromagnetic interactions between magnetic moments on vanadium and cerium ions induce a progressive magnetic polarization of the cerium sublattice at lower temperatures. The full magnetic structure is described by a superposition of the modes (C_x, F_y, -) and (F_x, C_y, -). The unit cell volume and the tilt angles of the VO₆-octahedra in the CeVO₃-crystal structure are anomalous compared to those of other members of the series RVO₃ (R = lanthanide atom), and the ordered magnetic moments on both vanadium and cerium sublattices at low temperatures are considerably smaller than the free-ion values of V³⁺ and Ce³⁺. Possible origins of this behavior are discussed.