484 Ch.

8 Ferrornagnetism in Hubbaxd Models

f
g 1.5
‘3
.-*w I
0
E 0.5

0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
Temperature [K] Temperature [K]

Figure 8.15: Close competition between metallic and insulating phases in

Prl/zSrl/zMnOs. The system is an AF insulator up to TV where it makes a first-
order transition to metallic ferromagnet. TC is the Curie temperature. The inset
shows the charge order at T < TV (after [402]).

of a field-induced transition. Choosing T = 100K (well below T, =

140K), a field of H M 2.7T suffices to switch the system to a strongly
polarized state with p~~ M 3 . 2 (Fig.~ ~ 8.16, left). This .is another
striking example of metamagnetic behaviour, with a mechanism quite
different from that of the other cases we have met.

Actually, a standard laboratory field of 7T suppresses the charge-

ordered insulator even at T = 0. The T-H phase diagram (Fig. 8.16,
right) shows that the Wigner crystal “melts” if we raise either the tem-
perature or the external field. The T = 0 transition is certainly a
“quantum melting” and one may ask why a magnetic field should seem
to induce fluctuations when in other circumstances (say, in InSb, see
p. 5 5 ) it drives towards localization. The reason is that in double-
exchange systems the charge and spin degrees of freedom are coupled
in a peculiar way, namely that polarizing the spins makes the charge
flow. Seen in this light, even the H = 0 transition at Tv is not really
thermal melting in the sense of merely disordering the Wigner crystal,
but rather it is a transition between two quantum phases with different
orders. The true disordering transition sets in at the much higher Tc.