Circular Dichroism in Resonant Inelastic X-Ray Scattering: Probing Altermagnetic Domains in MnTe
X-ray magnetic circular dichroism provides a means to identify ferromagnetic, chiral, and altermagnetic orders via their time-reversal-symmetry (T) breaking. However, the symmetry properties that govern circular dichroism (CD) in resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) remain poorly understood. We show that, due to the inherent irreversibility of the RIXS process, RIXS-CD does not require T breaking to be present, but reflects the change in unitary symmetries associated with magnetic ordering. Using the altermagnetic MnTe as a model system, we observe an azimuthal-angle dependent RIXS-CD signal in the magnon excitations. Our findings highlight the sensitivity of RIXS-CD to the relativistic symmetry in magnetic systems and its potential application as a probe of magnetic domains.
Authors
- Tatsuya Yamaguchi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5200-9566)
- Stefano Agrestini (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3625-880X)
- Kenya Ohgushi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0007-5397-6321)
- J. Kuneš (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9682-7640)
- Ke‐Jin Zhou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9293-0595)
- Sahil Tippireddy (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5383-6966)
- Mirian García‐Fernández (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6982-9066)
- T. Mizokawa (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7682-2348)
- D. Takegami (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3832-1849)
- Jiří Chaloupka (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8898-0442)
- H. Suzuki (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2973-0579)
- Atsushi Hariki (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3906-6069)
- T. Okauchi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-9935-3560)
- Takuya Aoyama (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4481-0801)
Institutions
- TU Wien (AT)
- Waseda University (JP)
- Tohoku University (JP)
- Masaryk University (CZ)
- Diamond Light Source (GB)
- Osaka Metropolitan University (JP)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Physical Review Letters
- Published
- 2025-11-06
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1103/512v-n5f9
- Citations
- 7
- Primary Topic
- Magnetic properties of thin films
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 8.73