Electronic and magnetic excitations in the half-stuffed Cu-O planes of <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:mrow><mml:msub><mml:mi>Ba</mml:mi><mml:mn>2</mml:mn></mml:msub><mml:msub><mml:mi>Cu</mml:mi><mml:mn>3</mml:mn></mml:msub><mml:msub><mml:mi mathvariant="normal">O</mml:mi><mml:mn>4</mml:mn></mml:msub><mml:msub><mml:mi>Cl</mml:mi><mml:mn>2</mml:mn></mml:msub></mml:mrow></mml:math> measured by resonant inelastic x-ray scattering

Sara Fatale, C. G. Fatuzzo, P. Babkevich, N. E. Shaik, Jonathan Pelliciari, Xingye Lu, Daniel McNally, Thorsten Schmitt, Akiko Kikkawa, Y. Taguchi

Abstract

We use resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) at the Cu L$_3$ edge to measure the charge and spin excitations in the "half-stuffed" Cu--O planes of the cuprate antiferromagnet Ba$_2$Cu$_3$O$_4$Cl$_2$. The RIXS line shape reveals distinct contributions to the $dd$ excitations from the two structurally inequivalent Cu sites, which have different out-of-plane coordinations. The low-energy response exhibits magnetic excitations. We find a spin-wave branch whose dispersion follows the symmetry of a CuO$_2$ sublattice, similar to the case of the "fully-stuffed" planes of tetragonal CuO (T-CuO). Its bandwidth is closer to that of a typical cuprate material, such as Sr$_2$CuO$_2$Cl$_2$, than it is to that of T-CuO. We interpret this result as arising from the absence of the effective four-spin inter-sublattice interactions that act to reduce the bandwidth in T-CuO.

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