Neutron scattering studies on the spin-peierls compound CuGeO3

Abstract

Spin-Peierls (SP) transition is a phenomenon where the antiferromagnetic. uniform S=1/2 chain system dimerizes and forms a nonmagnetic spin singlet ground state, SP transition was predicted theoretically already in 1962 [1] by an analogy with the Peierls transition based on the electron–lattice interaction, and experimentally observed in an organic compound TTF–CuBDT at 1975 [2]. In 1993, Hase et al. [3] reported the first inorganic SP compound, CuGeO3. For this material, a large single crystal can be grown with enough volume to study the dynamics of both lattice and spin systems and the interplay between them by means of neutron inelastic scattering. In this short article, we review some of the neutron scattering studies on magnetic excitations in CuGeO3, performed at the Japanese Research Reactor, JRR–3M of the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute (JAERI) in Tokai, Japan. The experiments were performed on ISSP–PONTA and JAERI TAS–I triple axis instruments under the cooperation with the Akimitsu group of Aoyama–Gakuin University.