Structural behaviour of synthetic Co2SiO4 at low temperatures
Andrew Sazonov1, Martin Meven, Vladimir Hutanu
1Institut für Kristallographie, Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) Aachen, D-52066 Aachen, Germany. andrew.sazonov@frm2.tum.de
Abstract:
Synthetic Co2SiO4 has an olivine structure with isolated SiO4 groups (space group Pnma) and shows magnetic ordering below 50 K. Single-crystal neutron diffraction was applied to determine precise crystal structure parameters at low temperatures. No structural phase transition was revealed in the temperature range 2.5-300 K. Lattice parameters were determined by high-resolution X-ray powder diffraction between 15 and 300 K. There is a clear evidence of an anomalous thermal expansion related to the magnetic phase transition which can be attributed to magnetostriction.
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