Magnetic Interaction Between Pr3+ and Dy3+ Spins and Their Spin Transition Induced by Magnetic Field in Dy0.5Pr0.5FeO3 Single Crystal

Rare earth orthoferrites are receiving ever-increasing attention for their potential applications in magneto-optical switching, multiferroics and novel physics originating from complicated interactions between magnetic rare earth and iron ions. In this work, Dy0.5Pr0.5FeO3 single crystal was studied in comparison with DyFeO3 and PrFeO3 single crystals, to ascertain effects of interactions between rare earth spins in Dy0.5Pr0.5FeO3 on its magnetic properties. Dy3+ and Pr3+ spins do not behave as separate entities in Dy0.5Pr0.5FeO3. The interaction between them was found to be the strongest below their antiferromagnetic ordering temperature. However, this interaction still persists to substantially higher temperatures. While the ordering temperature of Dy3+ spins is field-independent for DyFeO3, it becomes strongly field-dependent for Dy0.5Pr0.5FeO3. External field produces field-polarization of non-ordered rare earth spins below ~25 K for all three systems. High-field-induced spin transition of rare earth ...