Tuning of magnetocaloric effect in a La0.69Ca0.31MnO3 single crystal by pressure

Abstract

We report a study of the effect of hydrostatic pressure on the magnetocaloric effect in a La0.69Ca0.31MnO3 single crystal. The single crystal exhibits a much larger magnetic entropy change (ΔSm) than the corresponding polycrystalline samples, reaching 5.2J∕kgK and 8.5J∕kgK for a magnetic field variation of 1T and 5T, respectively. Under hydrostatic pressure, the peak position of ΔSm significantly moves to higher temperatures due to the shift of the magnetic phase transition, from 213.5K under ambient pressure up to 236.5K under a pressure of 1.1GPa, while the maximum value of ΔSm remains nearly the same. These exceptional results demonstrate that the magnetocaloric effect in magnetic materials with strong spin-lattice coupling can be effectively tuned by pressure.