Magnetic structure investigation of the intercalated transition metal dichalcogenide V1/3NbS2

We investigate the temperature evolution of the magnetic structure of V1/3NbS2 using neutron diffraction techniques. We find that V1/3NbS2 has two propagation vectors: k(0) = (0, 0, 0) and k(1) = (0, 0, 1/3). The k(0) vector can be associated with an antiferromagnetic ordering of in-plane moments with a refined value of 0.90(5)mu(B), and k(1) can be associated with moments along the c axis in an up-down-down configuration with refined values of 1.21(12)mu(B) and 0.61(6)mu(B). Both k(0) and k(1) magnetic components couple with an out-of-plane ferromagnetic moment consistent with magnetization data. Furthermore, single-crystal neutron diffraction shows evidence of diffuse magnetic scattering between the (010) and (01 +/- 1/3) Bragg peaks. We also characterize the field and temperature evolution of the magnetic structure in V1/3NbS2 by magnetic susceptibility and heat capacity measurements. The dc susceptibility measurements give an antiferromagnetic transition temperature of T-N = 50 K, and the field scans reveal that the moment does not saturate at magnetic fields up to 100 kOe.