Frustration of long-range order via lattice geometries serves to amplify fluctuations of the order parameter and generate unconventional ground states that are highly sensitive to perturbations. Traditionally, this concept of geometric frustration is used to engineer unconventional magnetic states in a variety of materials; however, the charge degree of freedom and bond order can be similarly frustrated. Finding materials that host both frustrated magnetic and bond networks holds promise for engineering structural and magnetic states with the potential of coupling to one another via either the magnetic sector (via magnetic field) or via the lattice sector (via strain). In this paper, we identify an unusual instance of this coexistence in the triangular lattice antiferromagnetic compounds LnCd3P3 (Ln = La, Ce, Pr, and Nd). These compounds feature two-dimensional planes of unique trigonal-planar CdP3 units that manifest an underlying bond instability with its long-range ordering frustrated via emergent kagome ice bond correlations. Our results establish LnCd3P3 as a rare class of materials where frustrated magnetism across a tunable rare-earth triangular network is embedded within a dopable semiconductor with a frustrated bond order instability.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2501.04203,
title = {Interleaved bond frustration in a triangular lattice antiferromagnet},
author = {S. J. Gomez Alvarado and J. R. Chamorro and D. Rout and J. Hielscher and Sarah Schwarz and Caeli Benyacko and M. B. Stone and V. Ovidiu Garlea and A. R. Jackson and G. Pokharel and R. Gomez and B. R. Ortiz and Suchismita Sarker and L. Kautzsch and L. C. Gallington and R. Seshadri and Stephen D. Wilson},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.04203},
year = {2026}
}