Institute of Physics, Southern Federal University, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.
J Phys Condens Matter. 2012 Jul 4;24(26):266002. doi: 10.1088/0953-8984/24/26/266002. Epub 2012 May 31.
Magnetoelectrics often possess ions located in noncentrosymmetric surroundings. Based on this fact we suggest a microscopic model of magnetoelectric interaction and show that the spin-orbit coupling leads to spin-dependent electric dipole moments of the electron orbitals of these ions, which results in non-vanishing polarization for certain spin configurations. The approach accounts for the macroscopic symmetry of the unit cell and is valid for both commensurate and complex incommensurate magnetic structures. The model is illustrated by the examples of MnWO(4), MnPS(3) and LiNiPO(4). Application to other magnetoelectrics is discussed.
磁电体通常具有位于非中心对称环境中的离子。基于这一事实，我们提出了一种磁电相互作用的微观模型，并表明自旋轨道耦合导致这些离子的电子轨道具有自旋相关的电偶极矩，这导致在某些自旋构型下极化不为零。该方法考虑了单元胞的宏观对称性，对于相容和复杂的非相容磁结构都是有效的。该模型通过 MnWO(4)、MnPS(3)和 LiNiPO(4)的例子来说明。还讨论了对其他磁电体的应用。
