Chiral properties of structure and magnetism in Mn(1-x)Fe(x)Ge compounds: when the left and the right are fighting, who wins?

Abstract

Magnetic susceptibility measurements have shown that the compounds Mn(1-x)Fe(x)Ge are magnetically ordered through the whole range of concentrations x = [0.0,1.0]. Small-angle neutron scattering reveals the helical nature of the spin structure with a wave vector, which changes from its maximum (|k| = 2.3 nm(-1)) for pure MnGe, through its minimum (|k| → 0) at x(c) ≈ 0.75, to the value of |k| = 0.09 nm(-1) for pure FeGe. The macroscopic magnetic measurements confirm the ferromagnetic nature of the compound with x = x(c). The observed transformation of the helix structure to the ferromagnet at x = x(c) is explained by different signs of chirality for the compounds with x > x(c) and x<x(c). We used x-ray diffraction and polarized neutron scattering to evaluate the crystallographic chirality Γ(c) and the magnetic chirality γ(m) of the FeGe single crystals. Similar to previous observations for FeSi-based compounds, FeGe demonstrates left- (right-)handed crystalline chirality acompained by right (left) handedness of the magnetic helix (Γ(c) γ(m) = -1). At variance, MnSi related compounds show the opposite behavior (Γ(c)γ(m) = 1). Since the magnetic chirality γ(m) relates to the sign of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI), for the same geometrical arrangement (Γ(c)) the sign of DMI can be set by the proper choice of the transition metal.