Occurrence of magnetoelectric effect correlated to the Dy order in Dy2NiMnO6 double perovskite

Magnetic, dielectric, and ac conductivity as well as room temperature structural and Raman studies are performed on double perovskite Dy2NiMnO6. The crystal structure of the compound adopts monoclinic P2(1)/n space group, where alternate Mn and Ni distorted octahedral are arranged in anti-phase a(-)a(-)b(+) order in Glazer notation. Magnetization studies show two magnetic transitions around 100K and 20K which are related to the ordering of transition and rare earth cations moment, respectively. Temperature dependent dielectric permittivity shows Havriliak-Negami type thermally activated dielectric relaxation. The ac conductivity at different temperature is found to follow Jonscher power law behavior. Time-temperature scaling of the conductivity spectra reveals that the charge transport dynamics is independent of temperature. Intriguingly, an anomaly in the dielectric constant is observed close to the order of Dy moment which indicates intrinsic magnetoelectric coupling. The hybridization between Dy and Ni/Mn is suggested to be correlated with the magnetoelectric coupling. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.