Proton-14N double resonance study of the structural phase transitions in the perovskite type layer compound (CH3NH3)2CdCl4

Abstract

Using a proton-nitrogen double resonance technique we have determined the quadrupole coupling of14N in the room temperature orthorhombic (Cmca), the low temperature tetragonal (P42/ncm), and the monoclinic low temperature (P21/c) phases of (CH3NH3)2CdCl4. In all these phases all nitrogens are chemically equivalent demonstrating that the disorder in the orientations and H-bonding arrangements of the CH3-NH3 groups in theC m c a andP42/ncm phases is indeed dynamic and not static. In the monoclinic phase the14N quadrupole coupling constant equalse2qQ/h=880 kHz and the asymmetry parameter isη=0.20, wherease2qQ/h=790 kHz,η=0.1 in the tetragonal low temperature phase ande2qQ/h=726 kHz,η=0.21 in the room temperature orthorhombic phase. The observed increase in the14N quadrupole coupling constant on going from the orthorhombic phase to the tetragonal low temperature phase which is coupled with a simultaneous decrease in the asymmetry parameter can be understood in terms of a partial freezing in of the dynamic disorder in the C-N bond directions whereas the14N quadrupole coupling tensor in the monoclinic phase is characteristic of a frozen in C-N bond in a deformed lattice, where the N-H — Cl bonds are of different length.