Frustrated Materials And Ferroic Glasses

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to ferroics and frustrated materials. Ferroics comprise a range of materials classes with functionalities such as magnetism, polarization, and orbital degrees of freedom and strain. Frustration, due to geometrical constraints, and disorder, due to chemical and/or structural inhomogeneities, can lead to glassy behavior, which has either been directly observed or inferred in a range of materials classes from model systems such as artificial spin ice, shape memory alloys, and ferroelectrics to electronically functional materials such as manganites. Interesting and unusual properties are found to be associated with these glasses and have potential for novel applications. Just as in prototypical spin glass and structural glasses, the elements of frustration and disorder lead to non-ergodocity, history dependence, frequency dependent relaxation behavior, and the presence of inhomogeneous nano clusters or domains. In addition, there are new states of matter, such as spin ice; however, it is still an open question as to whether these systems belong to the same family or universality class. The purpose of this work is to collect in a single volume the range of materials systems with differing functionalities that show many of the common characteristics of geometrical frustration, where interacting degrees of freedom do not fit in a lattice or medium, and glassy behavior is accompanied by additional presence of disorder. The chapters are written by experts in their fields and span experiment and theory, as well as simulations. Frustrated Materials and Ferroic Glasses will be of interest to a wide range of readers in condensed matter physics and materials science.

About sixty years ago, the anomalous magnetic response of certain magnetic alloys drew the attention of theoretical physicists. It soon became clear that understanding these systems, now called spin glasses, would give rise to a new branch of statistical physics. As physical materials, spin glasses were found to be as useless as they were exotic. They have nevertheless been recognized as paradigmatic examples of complex systems with applications to problems as diverse as neural networks, amorphous solids, biological molecules, social and economic interactions, information theory and constraint satisfaction problems.This book presents an encyclopaedic overview of the broad range of these applications. More than 30 contributions are compiled, written by many of the leading researchers who have contributed to these developments over the last few decades. Some timely and cutting-edge applications are also discussed. This collection serves well as an introduction and summary of disordered and glassy systems for advanced undergraduates, graduate students and practitioners interested in the topic.

Ferroic materials are important, not only because of the improved understanding of condensed matter, but also because of their present and potential device applications. This book presents a unified description of ferroic materials at an introductory level, with the unifying factor being the occurrence of nondisruptive phase transitions in crystals that alter point-group symmetry. The book also aims to further systemitize the subject of ferroic materials, employing some formal, carefully worded, definitions and classification schemes. The basic physical principles leading to the wide-ranging applications of ferroic materials are also explained, while placing extra emphasis on the utilitarian role of symmetry in materials science.

This handbook provides comprehensive treatment of the current state of glass science from the leading experts in the field. Opening with an enlightening contribution on the history of glass, the volume is then divided into eight parts. The first part covers fundamental properties, from the current understanding of the thermodynamics of the amorphous state, kinetics, and linear and nonlinear optical properties through colors, photosensitivity, and chemical durability. The second part provides dedicated chapters on each individual glass type, covering traditional systems like silicates and other oxide systems, as well as novel hybrid amorphous materials and spin glasses. The third part features detailed descriptions of modern characterization techniques for understanding this complex state of matter. The fourth part covers modeling, from first-principles calculations through molecular dynamics simulations, and statistical modeling. The fifth part presents a range of laboratory and industrial glass processing methods. The remaining parts cover a wide and representative range of applications areas from optics and photonics through environment, energy, architecture, and sensing. Written by the leading international experts in the field, the Springer Handbook of Glass represents an invaluable resource for graduate students through academic and industry researchers working in photonics, optoelectronics, materials science, energy, architecture, and more.

Nonlinear Optics on Ferroic Materials Covering the fruitful combination of nonlinear optics and ferroic materials! The use of nonlinear optics for the study of ferroics, that is, magnetically, electrically or otherwise spontaneously ordered and switchable materials has witnessed a remarkable development since its inception with the invention of the laser in the 1960s. This book on Nonlinear Optics on Ferroic Materials reviews and advances an overarching concept of ferroic order and its exploration by nonlinear-optical methods. In doing so, it brings together three fields of physics: symmetry, ferroic order, and nonlinear laser spectroscopy. It begins by introducing the fundamentals for each of these fields. The book then discusses how nonlinear optical studies help to reveal properties of ferroic materials that are often inaccessible with other methods. In this, consequent use is made of the unique degrees of freedom inherent to optical experiments. An excursion into the theoretical foundations of nonlinear optical processes in ferroics rounds off the discussion. The final part of the book explores classes of ferroic materials of primary interest. In particular, this covers multiferroics with magnetoelectric correlations and oxide-electronic heterostructures. An outlook towards materials exhibiting novel forms of ferroic states or correlated arrangements beyond ferroic order and the study these systems by nonlinear optics concludes the work. The book is aimed equally at experienced scientists and young researchers at the interface between condensed-matter physics and optics and with a taste for bold, innovative ideas.

A modern and thorough treatment of the field for upper-level undergraduate and graduate courses in materials science and chemistry.

The phase of condensed matter known as spin glasses has become a vital and productive area of research. Historically, experiment has suggested unusual effects which have brought the theoretical study of the spin Glass Problem Onto The Same Footing As The Experimental Study. Experiments in the late 1960s on magnetic alloys presented interesting effects which were difficult to explain. It took until the mid 1970s for new developments in condensed matter theory to reveal that a sharp phase transition was at the root of the phenomenon. John Mydosh tells the story of the spin glasses in a phenomenological way. He describes these materials first from the premise of an experiment, using figures and tables rather than equations and derivations. This empirical approach then leads to recent advances in finding and measuring spin glasses which closely mimic the theoretical models. The author describes spin glasses as a state of magnetic ordering in third place after ferromagnetism and antiferromagnetism. He also pays heed to the importance of amorphous or glassy materials in contemporary physics while also describing the richness of analogues with many areas of research from astrophysics via molecular evolution to zoology.

The scope of this work is to provide an extensive experimental investigation of ferrotoroidicity, the most recently established type of ferroic order that is based on the uniform unit-cell-sized alignment of magnetic whirls. This is achieved by transferring basic spin configurations pertinent for the emergence of toroidal order to mesoscopic length scales. An engineering of and access to the system's magnetic degrees of freedom is made possible by using nanomagnetic arrays as model systems. The work revealsmicroscopic and macroscopic aspects of toroidally ordered matter beyond the reach of natural materials.