Impact of Phonon-Magnon Scattering on Thermal Transport across Antiferromagnetic and Ferromagnetic Oxides
Abstract
Phonon--magnon coupling has been extensively studied in ferromagnets, whereas its microscopic mechanisms in antiferromagnets remain less understood. Here, we combine first-principles calculations with spin--lattice dynamics to investigate phonon--magnon interactions and their impact on thermal transport in antiferromagnetic NiO and MnO, which are put in contrast to the ferromagnetic EuO with an identical crystal structure. Green--Kubo and spectral energy density analyses show that spin dynamics reduce phonon thermal conductivity and lifetimes, with the strongest effects in MnO. Comparison of the excitation spectra indicates that spin-induced phonon scattering depends sensitively on the relative phonon and magnon energy scales, while the contrasting behavior of MnO and EuO further highlights the role of magnetic order. A simplified phase-space model further illustrates that, for comparable phonon and magnon energy scales, the antiferromagnetic case can support a larger phonon--magnon scattering phase space than the ferromagnetic case, suggesting a greater number of kinematically allowed scattering channels. These results identify excitation energy scales and magnetic order as key factors governing phonon--magnon scattering in magnetic materials.
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BibTeX
@misc{xiang2026impact,
title = {{Impact of Phonon-Magnon Scattering on Thermal Transport across Antiferromagnetic and Ferromagnetic Oxides}},
author = {Zeyu Xiang and Bolin Liao},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.32954},
eprint = {2609.32954},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.32954},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Impact of Phonon-Magnon Scattering on Thermal Transport across Antiferromagnetic and Ferromagnetic Oxides
AU - Zeyu Xiang
AU - Bolin Liao
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/26
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.32954
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.32954
AB - Phonon--magnon coupling has been extensively studied in ferromagnets, whereas its microscopic mechanisms in antiferromagnets remain less understood. Here, we combine first-principles calculations with spin--lattice dynamics to investigate phonon--magnon interactions and their impact on thermal transport in antiferromagnetic NiO and MnO, which are put in contrast to the ferromagnetic EuO with an identical crystal structure. Green--Kubo and spectral energy density analyses show that spin dynamics reduce phonon thermal conductivity and lifetimes, with the strongest effects in MnO. Comparison of the excitation spectra indicates that spin-induced phonon scattering depends sensitively on the relative phonon and magnon energy scales, while the contrasting behavior of MnO and EuO further highlights the role of magnetic order. A simplified phase-space model further illustrates that, for comparable phonon and magnon energy scales, the antiferromagnetic case can support a larger phonon--magnon scattering phase space than the ferromagnetic case, suggesting a greater number of kinematically allowed scattering channels. These results identify excitation energy scales and magnetic order as key factors governing phonon--magnon scattering in magnetic materials.
ER -