Single crystal growth and structure of La4Cu3MoO12

We report the synthesis and structure determination of single crystals of La4Cu3MoO12 grown from a CuO/KCl flux. This material, whose structure had previously been reported based solely on polycrystalline diffraction data, shows frustrated magnetic behavior and an anti-ferromagnetic ordering of spin-1/2 triangles at low temperatures. The structural and atomic parameters determined from the single crystal data are in very good agreement with those reported previously. However, HREM data showed evidence for disorder in the stacking of the Cu3MoO4 planes, and thus a twinned structural refinement in space group P21/m was replaced by an equivalent disordered structural model in space group Pm. This development of a synthetic route to single crystals of La4Cu3MoO12 will allow a more detailed investigation of its complex electronic and magnetic properties.

Graphical abstractStructural view of a single layer of the triangular lattice of La4Cu3MoO12 perpendicular to the b-axis. The copper atoms are blue, the oxide ions are red and the MoO5 trigonal bipyramids are yellow. The isolated triangular clusters of Cu3O are outlined by the thin blue lines.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide