Resonant inelastic x-ray scattering study of vector chiral ordered kagome antiferromagnet

Abstract

Abstract We study the resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) features of vector chiral ordered kagome antiferromagnets. Utilizing a group theoretical formalism that respects lattice site symmetry, we calculated the L-edge magnon contribution for the vesignieite compound BaCu3V2O8(OH)2. We show that polarization dependence of the L-edge RIXS spectrum can be used to track magnon branches. We predict a non-zero L-edge signal in the non-cross π−π polarization channel. At the K-edge, we derived the two-site effective RIXS and Raman scattering operator for two-magnon excitation in vesignieite using the Shastry–Shraiman formalism. Our derivation considers spin-orbit coupling effects in virtual hopping processes. We find vector chiral correlation (four-spin) contribution that is proportional to the RIXS spectrum. Our scattering operator formalism can be applied to a host of non-collinear non-coplanar magnetic materials at both the L and K-edge. We demonstrate that vector chiral correlations can be accessed by RIXS experiments.