Drastic enhancement of magnetic critical temperature and amorphization in topological magnet EuSn₂P₂ under pressure

High pressure is an effective tool to induce exotic quantum phenomena in magnetic topological insulators by controlling the interplay of magnetic order and topological state. This work presents a comprehensive high-pressure study of the crystal structure and magnetic ground state up to 62 GPa in an intrinsic topological magnet EuSn₂P₂. With a combination of high resolution X-ray diffraction, ¹⁵¹Eu synchrotron Mössbauer spectroscopy, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, molecular orbital calculations, and electronic band structure calculations, it has been revealed that pressure drives EuSn₂P₂ from a rhombohedral crystal to an amorphous phase at 36 GPa accompanied by a fourfold enhancement of magnetic ordering temperature. In the pressure-induced amorphous phase, Eu ions take an intermediate valence state. The drastic enhancement of magnetic ordering temperature from 30 K at ambient pressure to 130 K at 41.2 GPa resulting from Ruderman-Kittel-Kasuya-Yosida (RKKY) interactions likely attributes to the stronger Eu-Sn interaction at high pressure. These rich results demonstrate that EuSn₂P₂ is an ideal platform to study the correlation of the enhanced RKKY interactions, disordered lattice, intermediate valence, and topological state.

Wenli Bi, Trenton Culverhouse, Zachary Nix, Weiwei Xie, Hung-Ju Tien, Tay-Rong Chang, Utpal Dutta, Jiyong Zhao, Barbara Lavina, Esen E. Alp, Dongzhou Zhang, Jingui Xu, Yuming Xiao, Yogesh K. Vohra