MMIAO TianEPS (electronic phase separation) in manganites is the inhomogeneous spatial distribution of electronic phases, involving length scales much larger than those of structural defects or non-uniform distribution of chemical dopants.

Different theories have explained the origin of the electron phase separation in manganese oxides in the early days. One theory suggests that the disorder caused by chemical doping is the origin of the electron phase separation in manganese oxides.

If perfectly “clean” samples could be grown, both phase separation and nonlinearities would be replaced by a bicritical-like phase diagram.

However, it is very difficult to prepare fully ordered doped samples, and the study on the origin of electron phase separation in manganese oxides has been lack of direct experimental verification, which is still controversial.

Professor SHEN Jian from Fudan university cooperated with XI Chuanying and TIAN Mingliang from the High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Chinese Academy of Sciences. By using a layer-by-layer superlattice growth technique, they fabricate a fully chemically-ordered “tricolor” manganite superlattice, and compare their properties with those of isovalent alloyed manganite films.

They provide direct experimental evidence to show that the chemical-dopants induced disorder is the origin of electron phase separation in manganese oxides.

They report a breakthrough in addressing a long-standing and challenging issue: the physical origin of electronic phase separation phenomena in complex oxides.

The results were published in the international journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences under the title "Direct Experimental Evidence of Physical Origin of Electronic Phase Separation in Manganites".

The experimental data under the extremely low temperature and strong magnetic field were collected on the Steady High Magnetic Field Facility（SHMFF） WM1 unit.