Phase Separation in Doped Manganites

Abstract

The “phase separation” is a current topics in the field of magnetoresistive manganites. This is the phenomenon that a homogeneous compound is separated into several electronic and magnetic regions at low temperatures. From a structural point of view, we try to clarify the phenomena and its interrelation with the in-sulator-metal transition. We further discuss the difference between the “phase separation” and the two-phase coexistence in a bi-alloy system.
On the other hand, an important order-parameter of strongly-correlated electron system is the charge density n. Then, we expect a spontaneous fluctuation of n (charge separation), analogously to the two-phase coexistence in a bi-alloy system. Based on the recent experimental results, we argue the possibility of the charge separation.