Magnetic structure of phase II in U(Ru(0.96)Rh(0.04))2Si2 determined by neutron diffraction under pulsed high magnetic fields

Phys Rev Lett. 2013 May 24;110(21):216406. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.216406. Epub 2013 May 23.

Abstract

We report neutron diffraction measurements on U(Ru(0.96)Rh(0.04))(2)Si(2) single crystal under pulsed high magnetic fields up to 30 T applied along the tetragonal c axis. The high-field experiments revealed that the field-induced phase II above 26 T corresponds to a commensurate up-up-down ferrimagnetic structure characterized by the wave vector q=(2/3,0,0) with the magnetic moments parallel to the c axis, which naturally explains the one-third magnetization plateau and the substantially changed Fermi surface in phase II. This a-axis modulated magnetic structure indicates that the phase II near the hidden order phase is closely related to the characteristic incommensurate magnetic fluctuations at Q(1)=(0.6,0,0) in the pure system URu(2)Si(2), in contrast to the pressure-induced antiferromagnetic order at Q(0)=(1,0,0).