Access by Xinjiang University

Evidence for rare-region physics in the structural and electronic degrees of freedom of the nickelate $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$

R. J. Spieker ¹, B. Krohnke ¹, D. Zhai ¹, A. Lopez Benet ¹, M. Spaić ², X. He ¹, C. Y. Tan ¹, Z. W. Anderson ^1,*, F. Ye ³ et al.

H. Cao ³, M. J. Krogstad ⁴, R. Osborn ⁵, D. Pelc ^1,2,†, and M. Greven ^1,‡

¹School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, USA
²Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
³Neutron Scattering Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37831, USA
⁴Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, USA
⁵Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, USA

^*Present address: Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, USA.
^†Contact author: dpelc@phy.hr
^‡Contact author: greven@umn.edu

PDF

Phys. Rev. Materials 10, 095001 – Published 8 September, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/lzbm-883c

Abstract

We present a diffuse neutron and x-ray scattering study of structural as well as spin- and charge-density-wave fluctuations in the electrical insulator $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ . This lamellar nickelate is an isostructural analog of the high-temperature cuprate superconductor $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Cu O_{4}$ , for which recent experiments uncovered evidence for unusual structural and superconducting fluctuations indicative of rare-region physics due to inherent inhomogeneity unrelated to common point disorder effects. Here we find closely analogous nanoscale orthorhombic fluctuation behavior in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ , including exponential scaling of the diffuse scattering intensity and power-law scaling of the characteristic length with relative temperature. Moreover, our neutron and x-ray scattering data reveal similar behavior for short-range magnetic and charge fluctuations above the respective ordering temperatures. These observations indicate that rare-region effects are a generic feature of perovskite-related structures and lead to universal fluctuations of both structural and electronic degrees of freedom over extended temperature ranges.

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (56)

J. G. Bednorz and K. A. Müller, Possible high- $T_{c}$ superconductivity in the Ba-La-Cu-O system, Z. Phys. B: Condens. Mater. 64, 189 (1986).
V. I. Anisimov, D. Bukhvalov, and T. M. Rice, Electronic structure of possible nickelate analogs to the cuprates, Phys. Rev. B 59, 7901 (1999).
J. M. Tranquada, Charge stripes and antiferromagnetism in insulating nickelates and superconducting cuprates, J. Phys. Chem. Solids 59, 2150 (1998).
S. Kakol, J. Spałek, and J. M. Honig, Superconductivity and antiferromagnetism in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ , J. Solid State Chem. 79, 288 (1989).
S. M. Hayden, G. H. Lander, J. Zarestky, P. J. Brown, C. Stassis, P. Metcalf, and J. M. Honig, Incommensurate magnetic correlations in ${La}_{1.8} {Sr}_{0.2} {NiO}_{4}$ , Phys. Rev. Lett. 68, 1061 (1992).
J. M. Tranquada, B. Sternlieb, J. Axe, and Y. Nakamura, Evidence for stripe correlations of spins and holes in copper oxide superconductors, Nature (London) 375, 561 (1995).
V. Sachan and D. J. Buttrey, Charge and spin ordering in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4.00}$ with $x = 0.135$ and 0.2, Phys. Rev. B 51, 12742 (1995).
J. M. Tranquada, D. J. Buttrey, and V. Sachan, Incommensurate stripe order in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ with $x = 0.225$ , Phys. Rev. B 54, 12318 (1996).
J. M. Tranquada, Stripe correlations of spins and holes in cuprates and nickelates, Ferroelectrics 177, 43 (1996).
H. Yoshizawa, T. Kakeshita, and R. Kajimoto, Stripe order at low temperatures in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ with 0.289 ≤ $x$ ≤ 0.5, Phys. Rev. B 61, R854(R) (2000).
P. D. Hatton, M. E. Ghazi, S. B. Wilkins, P. D. Spencer, D. Mannix, T. d’Almeida, P. Prabhakaran, A. Boothroyd, and S.-W. Cheong, X-ray scattering studies of charge stripes in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ ( $x$ = 0.20–0.33), Phys. B 318, 289 (2002).
N. Plakida, Antiferromagnetism in cuprate superconductors, In High-Temperature Cuprate Superconductors, Springer Series in Solid-State Sciences Vol. 166 (Springer, New York, 2010).
J. M. Tranquada, Spins, stripes, and superconductivity in hole-doped cuprates, AIP Conf. Proc. 1550, 114 (2013).
S. Anissimova, D. Parshall, G. D. Gu, K. Marty, M. D. Lumsden, S. Chi, J. A. Fernandez-Baca, D. L. Abernathy, D. Lamago, J. M. Tranquada, and D. Reznik, Direct observation of dynamic charge stripes in $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ , Nat. Commun. 5, 3467 (2014).
J. Zhang and X. Tao, Review on quasi-2D square planar nickelates, CrystEngComm 23, 3249 (2021).
D. Li, K. Lee, B. Y. Wang, M. Osada, S. Crossley, H. R. Lee, Y. Cui, Y. Hikita, and H. Y. Hwang, Superconductivity in an infinite-layer nickelate, Nature (London) 572, 624 (2019).
B. Y. Wang, K. Lee, and B. H. Goodge, Experimental progress in superconducting nickelates, Annu. Rev. Condens. Matter Phys. 15, 305 (2024).
G. A. Pan et al., Superconductivity in a quintuple-layer square-planar nickelate, Nat. Mater. 21, 160 (2022).
Y. Lee, X. Wei, Y. Yu, L. Bhatt, K. Lee, B. H. Goodge, S. P. Harvey, B. Y. Wang, D. A. Muller, L. F. Kourkoutis, W.-S. Lee, S. Raghu, and H. Y. Hwang, Synthesis of superconducting freestanding infinite-layer nickelate heterostructures on the millimetre scale, Nat. Synthesis 4, 573 (2025).
H. Sun, M. Huo, X. Hu, J. Li, Z. Liu, Y. Han, L. Tang, Z. Mao, P. Yang, B. Wang, J. Cheng, D.-X. Yao, G.-M. Zhang, and M. Wang, Signatures of superconductivity near 80 K in a nickelate under high pressure, Nature (London) 621, 493 (2023).
Y. Zhang, D. Su, Y. Huang, Z. Shan, H. Sun, M. Huo, K. Ye, J. Zhang, Z. Yang, Y. Xu, Y. Su, R. Li, M. Smidman, M. Wang, L. Jiao, and H. Yuan, High-temperature superconductivity with zero resistance and strange-metal behavior in $L a_{3} N i_{2} O_{7 - δ}$ , Nat. Phys. 20, 1269 (2024).
N. Wang et al., Bulk high-temperature superconductivity in pressurized tetragonal ${La}_{2} {PrNi}_{2} O_{7}$ , Nature (London) 634, 579 (2024).
Y. Zhu et al., Superconductivity in pressurized trilayer $L a_{4} N i_{3} O_{10 - δ}$ single crystals, Nature (London) 631, 531 (2024).
J. A. Krumhansl, Fine scale mesostructures in superconducting and other materials, in Proceedings of the Conference on the Lattice Effects in High- $T_{c}$ Superconductors (World Scientific, Singapore, 1992).
S. H. Pan, J. P. O’Neal, R. L. Badzey, C. Chamon, H. Ding, J. R. Engelbrecht, Z. Wang, H. Eisaki, S. Uchida, A. K. Gupta, K.-W. Ng, E. W. Hudson, K. M. Lang, and J. C. Davis, Microscopic electronic inhomogeneity in the high- $T_{c}$ superconductor $B i_{2} S r_{2} CaC u_{2} O_{8 + x}$ , Nature (London) 413, 282 (2001).
J. C. Phillips, A. Saxena, and A. R. Bishop, Pseudogaps, dopants, and strong disorder in cuprate high-temperature superconductors, Rep. Prog. Phys. 66, 2111 (2003).
E. Dagotto, Complexity in strongly correlated electronic systems, Science 309, 257 (2005).
O. Fischer, M. Kugler, I. Maggio-Aprile, C. Berthod, and C. Renner, Scanning tunneling microscopy of high-temperature superconductors, Rev. Mod. Phys. 79, 353 (2007).
A. N. Pasupathy, A. Pushp, K. K. Gomes, C. V. Parker, J. Wen, Z. Xu, G. Gu, S. Ono, Y. Ando, and A. Yazdani, Electronic origin of the inhomogeneous pairing interaction in the high- $T_{c}$ superconductor $B i_{2} S r_{2} CaC u_{2} O_{8 + δ}$ , Science 320, 196 (2008).
M. Fratini, N. Poccia, A. Ricci, G. Campi, M. Burghammer, G. Aeppli, and A. Bianconi, Scale-free structural organization of oxygen interstitials in $L a_{2} Cu O_{4 + y}$ , Nature (London) 466, 841 (2010).
J. W. Alldredge, K. Fujita, H. Eisaki, S. Uchida, and K. McElroy, Universal disorder in $B i_{2} S r_{2} CaC u_{2} O_{8 + x}$ , Phys. Rev. B 87, 104520 (2013).
D. Pelc, M. Vučković, M. S. Grbić, M. Požek, G. Yu, T. Sasagawa, M. Greven, and N. Barišić, Emergence of superconductivity in the cuprates via a universal percolation process, Nat. Commun. 9, 4327 (2018).
P. Popčević, D. Pelc, Y. Tang, K. Velebit, Z. Anderson, V. Nagarajan, G. Yu, M. Požek, N. Barišić, and M. Greven, Percolative nature of the direct current paraconductivity in the cuprate superconductors, npj Quantum Mater. 3, 42 (2018).
G. Yu, D.-D. Xia, D. Pelc, R.-H. He, N.-H. Kaneko, T. Sasagawa, Y. Li, X. Zhao, N. Barišić, and M. Greven, Universal precursor of superconductivity in the cuprates, Phys. Rev. B 99, 214502 (2019).
D. Pelc, Z. Anderson, B. Yu, C. Leighton, and M. Greven, Universal superconducting precursor in three classes of unconventional superconductors, Nat. Commun. 10, 2729 (2019).
M. Frachet, I. Vinograd, R. Zhou, S. Benhabib, S. Wu, H. Mayaffre, S. Krämer, S. K. Ramakrishna, A. P. Reyes, J. Debray, T. Kurosawa, N. Momono, M. Oda, S. Komiya, S. Ono, M. Horia, J. Chang, C. Proust, D. LeBoeuf, and M.-H. Julien, Hidden magnetism at the pseudogap critical point of a high-temperature superconductor, Nat. Phys. 16, 1064 (2020).
D. Pelc, R. J. Spieker, Z. W. Anderson, M. J. Krogstad, N. Biniskos, N. G. Bielinski, B. Yu, T. Sasagawa, L. Chauviere, P. Dosanjh, R. Liang, D. A. Bonn, A. Damascelli, S. Chi, Y. Liu, R. Osborn, and M. Greven, Unconventional short-range structural fluctuations in cuprate superconductors, Sci. Rep. 12, 20483 (2022).
Z. W. Anderson, M. Spaić, N. Biniskos, L. Thompson, B. Yu, J. Zwettler, Y. Liu, F. Ye, G. E. Granroth, M. Krogstad, R. Osborn, D. Pelc, and M. Greven, Nanoscale structural correlations in a model cuprate superconductor, Phys. Rev. B 110, 214519 (2024).
R. J. Spieker, M. Spaić, I. Khayr, X. He, D. Zhai, Z. W. Anderson, N. G. Bielinski, F. Ye, Y. Liu, S. Chi, S. Sarker, M. J. Krogstad, R. Osborn, D. Pelc, and M. Greven, Pervasive symmetry-lowering nanoscale structural fluctuations in the cuprate $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Cu O_{4}$ , Phys. Rev. B 113, 014101 (2026).
T. Vojta, Rare region effects at classical, quantum and nonequilibrium phase transitions, J. Phys. A Math. Gen. 39, R143 (2006).
R. B. Griffiths, Nonanalytic behaviour above critical point in a random Ising ferromagnet, Phys. Rev. Lett. 23, 17 (1969).
T. Vojta, Quantum Griffiths effects and smeared phase transitions in metals: Theory and experiment, J. Low Temp. Phys. 161, 299 (2010).
S. Ubaid-Kassis, T. Vojta, and A. Schroeder, Quantum Griffiths phase in the weak itinerant ferromagnetic alloy $N i_{1 - x} V_{x}$ , Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 066402 (2010).
J. D. Axe and M. K. Crawford, Structural instabilities in lanthanum cuprate superconductors, J. Low Temp. Phys. 95, 271 (1994).
A. Bianconi, N. L. Saini, A. Lanzara, M. Missori, T. Rossetti, H. Oyanagi, H. Yamaguchi, K. Oka, and T. Ito, Determination of the local lattice distortions in the ${CuO}_{2}$ plane of ${La}_{1.85} {Sr}_{0.15} {CuO}_{4}$ , Phys. Rev. Lett. 76, 3412 (1996).
E. S. Božin, S. J. L. Billinge, and G. H. Kwei, Re-examination of the second-order structural phase transition in $L a_{2 - x} A_{x} Cu O_{4}$ (A = Ba, Sr), Physica B 241-243, 795 (1997).
S. Wakimoto, H. Kimura, M. Fujita, K. Yamada, Y. Noda, G. Shirane, G. Gu, H. Kim, and R. J. Birgeneau, Incommensurate lattice distortion in the high temperature tetragonal phase of $L a_{2 - x} {(Sr, Ba)}_{x} Cu O_{4}$ , J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 75, 074714 (2006).
M. Hücker, K. Chung, M. Chand, T. Vogt, J. M. Tranquada, and D. J. Buttrey, Oxygen and strontium co-doping of ${La}_{2} {NiO}_{4}$ : Room-temperature phase diagram, Phys. Rev. B 70, 064105 (2004).
R. Osborn, D. Pelc, M. J. Krogstad, S. Rosenkranz, and M. Greven, Diffuse scattering from correlated electron systems, Sci. Adv. 11, eadt7770 (2025).
F. Ye, Y. Liu, R. Whitfield, R. Osborn, and S. Rosenkranz, Implementation of cross correlation for energy discrimination on the time-of-flight spectrometer CORELLI, J. Appl. Cryst. 51, 315 (2018).
Y. Takeda, R. Kanno, M. Sakano, O. Yamamoto, M. Takano, Y. Bando, H. Akinaga, K. Takita, and J. B. Goodenough, Crystal chemistry and physical properties of $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$ (0 ≤ $x$ ≤ 0.16), Mater. Res. Bull. 25, 293 (1990).
NeXpy NXRefine, https://nexpy.github.io/nxrefine/.
S.-H. Baek, A. Erb, B. Büchner, and H.-J. Grafe, ${}^{139}{La}$ NMR investigation in underdoped ${La}_{1.93} {Sr}_{0.07} {CuO}_{4}$ , Phys. Rev. B 85, 184508 (2012).
A. Singh, J. Schefer, R. Sura, K. Conder, R. F. Sibille, M. Ceretti, M. Frontzek, and W. Paulus, Evidence for monoclinic distortion in the ground state phase of underdoped ${La}_{1.95} {Sr}_{0.05} {CuO}_{4}$ : A single crystal neutron diffraction study, J. Appl. Phys. 119, 123902 (2016).
A. Herlihy, W.-T. Chen, C. Ritter, Y.-Ch. Chuang, and M. S. Senn, Interplay between Jahn−Teller distortions and structural phase transitions in Ruddlesden−Poppers, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 147, 7209 (2025).
J. P. Tidey, C. Keegan, N. C. Bristowe, A. A. Mostofi, Z.-M. Hong, B.-H. Chen, Y.-C. Chuang, W.-T. Chen, and M. S. Senn, Structural origins of the low-temperature orthorhombic to low-temperature tetragonal phase transition in high- $T_{c}$ cuprates, Phys. Rev. B 106, 085112 (2022).

Physical Review Materials

Export citation

Export citation

Evidence for rare-region physics in the structural and electronic degrees of freedom of the nickelate $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$

Abstract

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (56)

Outline

Information

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation

Evidence for rare-region physics in the structural and electronic degrees of freedom of the nickelate La2−xSrxNiO4

Abstract

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (56)

Evidence for rare-region physics in the structural and electronic degrees of freedom of the nickelate $L a_{2 - x} S r_{x} Ni O_{4}$