In this paper, we present a comprehensive study of the electronic structure of CeCoGe3 throughout the entire Brillouin zone in the non-magnetic regime using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES). The electronic structure agrees in large part with first principles calculations, including predicted topological nodal lines. Two new features in the band structure are also observed, namely a surface state and folded bands, the latter of which is argued to originate from a unit cell reconstruction.

In order to elucidate the mechanism creating superconductivity in the 2-dimensional layer of a p-doped Sn/Si(111) surface, we have analyzed the many-body effects associated with the electron-phonon (e-ph) coupling and the electron–electron interaction. First, we have calculated the DFT surface band of the system and the coupling associated with the different interactions. In our calculations we find a mean field (DFT) electron bandwidth of 0.54 eV, an attractive coupling Uneg=0.32 eV associated with the e-ph coupling and an effective electron–electron Hubbard repulsion of U=0.83 eV. Then, we analyze the Hubbard Hamiltonian, neglecting in this step the e-ph coupling that is much smaller than the Hubbard coupling, by considering a p-doping in this Hamiltonian of 10%; by means of a Dynamical Mean Field (DMF) approach combined with an interpolative calculation for the self-energy, we deduce the local density of states (DOS) and show that the quasi-particle DOS induced by the doping is not large enough to induce magnetism in the Sn-monolayer. This leads us to analyze the possibility of having superconductivity by considering the attractive interaction induced by the e-ph coupling within an appropriate BCS-Hamiltonian. Our calculations show that the quasiparticle metallic system has a superconductivity critical temperature of ≈7–9 K, in good agreement with experiments.

The study of new nanoscopic heterostructures composed of different materials follows the idea that the presence of boundary conditions, interfaces and combinations of materials will produce appropriate spectral properties or quantum states, resulting in new devices. Here, we present a detailed study of two kinds of nanowires formed using topological insulators. First, we consider cylindrical nanowires with a cylindrical core of constant radius along the wire, covered by a shell of uniform width. The core and the shell materials are different topological insulators. We thoroughly study the spectra of distinct wires, considering combinations of materials and sizes of the core and shell radii. We also study the expectation values of the spin operators. Then, we consider wires with only a cylindrical shell. For this case, we pay special attention to the limit when the width of the shell is approximately an order of magnitude smaller than the inner and outer radii of the shell. As we use a high-accuracy variational method to obtain the spectra and quantum states, we also study information-like quantities such as the fidelity and quantum entropy of the topological and normal states of the wires.

Magnetic toroidal multipoles have recently emerged as key descriptors of unconventional cross-correlation phenomena in antiferromagnetic systems. Among them, the rank-2 magnetic toroidal quadrupole, which is characterized as a time-reversal-odd polar tensor, has been theoretically associated with a variety of cross-correlation phenomena arising from the time-reversal symmetry breaking. In this study, we investigate the interplay between magnetic toroidal quadrupoles and electric toroidal dipoles in antiferromagnets, with a particular focus on magnetic field-induced ferroaxiality. Through symmetry analysis and microscopic model calculations, we demonstrate that ferroaxiality can be induced by an external magnetic field, depending on both the field direction and the type of the magnetic toroidal quadrupole. We classify all magnetic point groups that possess magnetic toroidal quadrupoles and identify various candidate materials based on the MAGNDATA database. Our findings reveal a route to coupling spin and lattice degrees of freedom via toroidal multipoles.

The standard models of particle physics and of cosmology have been enormously successful in correlating a large amount of data. However, there are missing pieces and we are still far from what the ultimate model may look like. We give a broad perspective of both the achievements and of the missing pieces and discuss what may lie beyond.

In this study, the curvature changes of an unintentionally doped GaN end and third quantum well were observed in situ when the annealing times of a GaN buffer layer were 40 s, 50 s and 55 s, respectively. When the annealing time was increased from 40 s to 50 s, the concave curvature of the unintentionally doped GaN end and the third quantum well became smaller. When the annealing time was increased to 55 s, there was no significant change in curvature. These curvature changes are related to the relaxation of the stress in the epitaxial wafer with different annealing times. With the increase in buffer annealing time, the compressive stress and warpage decreased gradually, and the photoluminescence wavelength of the sample became longer. Meanwhile, the standard deviation yield of the dominant wavelength was increased by 5.46%, and the wavelength yield was increased by 19.45% when the annealing time was changed from 40 s to 50 s.

Thin films of monomeric species polythiophene (PTh), poly-(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT), and the copolymer PTh/PEDOT were prepared through electropolymerization and deposited above fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates. The functional groups of the monomeric species (PTh, PEDOT) and polymeric species (PTh/PEDOT) were characterized by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, while morphological properties were evaluated using scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy, and atomic force microscopy. The analysis showed that monomers films exhibited less material deposition; otherwise, the copolymer PTh/PEDOT showed better deposition on substrate. In addition, the electrochemical characterization showed that the materials that resulted from copolymerization presented an improvement in electrochemical properties relating to monomer properties. The effect of overoxidation of the monomers applied during the electropolymerization process is also known.

In recent years, significant effort was made to make the 3D printing of fully dense rare-earth permanent magnets a reality. Since suitable Nd2Fe14B-based initial powder material became available, additive manufacturing implementation spread widely, which led to many studies being focused on using this material in 3D printing. This study shows the principal possibilities of the synthesis of Nd-Fe-B magnets by means of the laser powder bed fusion technique; moreover, this study shows significant progress in increasing their magnetic properties. This progress was made possible by different approaches, such as 3D-printing process optimization, the addition of a second phase (a low-melting eutectic) into the initial powder, the tuning of the main phase’s composition, and exploring different scanning strategies. However, the current level of material magnetic properties obtained via laser powder bed fusion is still far from that of magnets produced by using conventional powder metallurgy methods. The present review aims to capture the current state-of-the-art trials and highlight the main challenges.

Basic principles of ferroelectric activity induced by the noncollinear alignment of spins are reviewed. There is a fundamental reason why the inversion symmetry can be broken by certain magnetic order. This situation occurs when the magnetic order simultaneously involves ferromagnetic (F) and antiferromagnetic (A) counterparts, transforming under the spatial inversion I and time reversal T as IF=F and ITA=A, respectively. The incompatibility of these two conditions results in breaking the inversion symmetry, which manifests itself in the electric polarization P→. The noncollinear alignment of spins is one of examples of such coexistence of F and A. This coexistence principle imposes a constraint on possible dependencies of P→ on the directions of spins, which can include only “antisymmetric coupling” in the bond, P→ij·[ei×ej], and “single-ion anisotropy”, ei· Π→ ei. Microscopically, P→ij can be evaluated in the framework of superexchange theory. For the single Kramers doublet, this theory yields P→ij∼r→ij0, where r→ij0 is the spin-dependent part of the position operator induced by the relativistic spin-orbit coupling. r→ij0 remains invariant under spatial inversion, providing the microscopic reason why noncollinear alignment of spins can induce P→ even in centrosymmetric crystals. The symmetry properties of r→ij0 can be rationalized from the viewpoint of symmetry of Kramers states. Particularly, the commonly used Katsura–Nagaosa–Balatsky (KNB) rule P→∝ϵ→ji×[ei×ej] (ϵ→ji being the direction of the bond ij) can be justified only for relatively high symmetry of the bonds. The single-ion anisotropy vanishes for the spin 12 or if magnetic ions are located in inversion centers, thus severely restricting the applicability of this microscopic mechanism. The properties of multiferroic materials are reconsidered from the viewpoint of these principles. A particular attention is paid to complications caused by possible deviations from the KNB rule.

High-Precision X-ray Measurements 2023 is a Special Issue of the journal Condensed Matter enclosing the scientific content of the 2023 High-Precision X-ray Measurements (HPXRM) conference [...]