Rattling in the Quadruple Perovskite CuCu3 V4 O12.

Of particular interest is a peculiar motion of guest atoms or ions confined to nanospace in cage compounds, called rattling. While rattling provides unexplored physical properties through the guest-host interactions, it has only been observed in a very limited class of materials. Herein, we introduce an A-site-ordered quadruple perovskite, CuCu3 V4 O12 , as a new family of cage compounds. This novel AA'3 B4 O12 -type perovskite has been obtained by a high-pressure synthesis technique and structurally characterized to have cubic Im$\bar 3$ symmetry with an ionic model of Cu(2+) Cu(2+) 3 V(4+) 4 O12 . The thermal displacement parameter of the A-site Cu(2+) ion is as large as Uiso ≈0.045 Å(2) at 300 K, indicating its large-amplitude thermal oscillations in the oversized icosahedral cages. Remarkably, the presence of localized phonon modes associated with rattling of the A-site Cu(2+) ion manifests itself in the low-temperature specific heat data. This work sheds new light on the structure-property relations in perovskites.

AgCu3V4O12: a novel perovskite containing mixed-valence silver ions.

A novel silver-containing perovskite, AgCu3V4O12, was synthesized under high-pressure and high-temperature conditions. It crystallizes in an A-site-ordered perovskite structure (space group Im3), in which silver ions occupy the 12-coordinated A sites forming regular icosahedra, and exhibits metallic behavior. Bond-valence-sum calculations and X-ray photoemission spectroscopy reveal that Ag ions are present in the mixed-valence state, most likely attributable to the coexistence of Ag(+) and Ag(3+), unlike the case of well-known perovskite-type AgNbO3 and AgTaO3 containing only Ag(+) ions. We discuss metallic conduction in relation to electronic structure calculations.

A-site-ordered perovskite MnCu3V4O12 with a 12-coordinated manganese(II).

A novel cubic perovskite MnCu3V4O12 has been synthesized at a high pressure and high temperature of 12 GPa and 1373 K. This compound crystallizes in the A-site-ordered perovskite structure (space group Im3) with lattice constant a = 7.26684(10) Å at room temperature. The most notable feature of this compound lies in the fact that the Mn(2+) ion is surrounded by 12 equidistant oxide ions to form a regular icosahedron; the situation of Mn(2+) is unprecedented for the crystal chemistry of an oxide. An anomalously large atomic displacement parameter U(iso)= 0.0222(8) Å(2) is found for Mn(2+) at room temperature, indicating that the thermal oscillation of the small Mn(2+) ion in a large icosahedron is fairly active. Magnetic susceptibility and electric resistivity measurements reveal that 3d electrons of Mn(2+) ions are mainly localized, while 3d electrons in Cu(2+) and V(4+) ions are delocalized and contribute to the metallic conduction.