Magnetic field dependent thermal conductance in La0.67Ca0.33MnO3

Using the differential 3ω technique we measured the low-temperature out-of-plane thermal conductance of heteroepitaxial thin film La0.67Ca0.33MnO3 (LCMO). The magnetic field dependence of the thermal conductance reached values of up to 23%. The effect was observed to be largest in the vicinity of the metal-insulator transition, since the enhancement in thermal conductance is triggered by the colossal magnetoresistance effect increasing the electronic contribution to the thermal conductance. The point of the maximal change was adjusted by post-annealing the samples in an oxygen atmosphere. Samples with a higher transition temperature and lower epitaxial strain displayed a lower magnetic field dependence of up to 8% of the zero-field value. While the samples with a low strain state seemingly obeyed the Wiedemann-Franz law, those under high strain did not. Raman spectroscopy was applied to explain this discrepancy by an enhanced phononic density of states caused by rotational distortions of the unit cell. Our results show that in systems with strong electron-lattice interaction manipulation of the phonon spectrum is possible by magnetic fields.