Sabrina R. Hatt | Search arXiv

arXiv2026

Altermagnetism produces pair emission and absorption from dark excitons and magnons in La$_2$O$_3$Mn$_2$Se$_2$

Altermagnets' (AMs) non-relativistic spin splitting enables novel states, spintronic and magneto-optical devices, though their optical signatures remain elusive. Here, we report exciton-magnon emission and absorption: optical sidebands from a spin-forbidden dark exciton, a direct consequence of altermagnetic symmetry. Combined optical spectroscopy and first-principles calculations reveal that La$_2$O$_3$Mn$_2$Se$_2$ is an altermagnetic insulator, hosting a strongly bound, spin-forbidden dark exciton and a higher-energy bright exciton. Photoluminescence (PL) and absorption reveal mirror-image sidebands, Stokes-shifted in emission and anti-Stokes-shifted in absorption, symmetric about the dark exciton, whose energy shifts and spectral shapes match the magnon energy scale and density of states measured independently by inelastic neutron scattering. The PL intensity tracks the full equal-time spin-spin correlator, combining static and dynamical contributions, and rules out alternative processes. This directly couples PL to magnetism, with potential for magneto-optical devices. These results establish exciton-magnon spectroscopy as a new route for optically identifying and exploiting AMs.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2025

Cluster spin glass correlations and dynamics in Zn$_{0.5}$Mn$_{0.5}$Te

We present a magnetometry, muon spin relaxation ($μ$SR), and neutron scattering study of the insulating face-centered-cubic spin glass Zn$_{0.5}$Mn$_{0.5}$Te. The magnetometry and $μ$SR results confirm a spin freezing transition around $T_f \approx 23$ K, with the spin fluctuation rate decreasing gradually and somewhat inhomogeneously through the sample volume as the temperature decreases toward $T_f$. Characteristic spin correlation times well above $T_f$ are on the order of 10$^{-10}$ s, in line with expectations for a cluster spin glass. Using magnetic pair distribution function (mPDF) analysis and reverse Monte Carlo (RMC) modeling of the magnetic diffuse neutron scattering data, we show that the spin-glass ground state consists of clusters of spins exhibiting short-range-ordered type-III antiferromagnetic correlations, with a locally ordered moment of 3.1(1) $μ_{\mathrm{B}}$ between nearest-neighbor spins. The type-III correlations decay exponentially as a function of spin separation distance with a correlation length of approximately 5 Å. The diffuse magnetic scattering and corresponding mPDF show no significant changes across $T_f$, indicating that the dynamically fluctuating short-range spin correlations in the paramagnetic state retain the same basic type-III configuration; the only change apparent from the neutron scattering data is a gradual reduction of the correlation length and locally ordered moment with increasing temperature. Taken together, these results paint a unique and detailed picture of the local magnetic structure and dynamics in Zn$_{0.5}$Mn$_{0.5}$Te and show that this material is best described as a cluster spin glass. In addition, this work showcases a statistical method for extracting diffuse scattering signals from neutron powder diffraction data.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗