Iridium compounds have received a lot of attention in the recent years, a prominent example being the Ruddlesden-Popper series, Sr_(n+1)Ir_nO_(3n+1), where one could observe how the physical properties change from an antiferromagnetic relativistic Mott insulator for n=1 to a nonmagnetic Weyl semimetal for n = ∞. The investigations of these materials offer a unique opportunity to understand the impact of the relativistic phenomena, dimensionality and correlations on the electronic transport and magnetic behavior, all within the same series.
In order to understand the role of small structural changes connected to the cation size, we exchange Sr for Ca and study the metastable, orthorhombic perovskite phase of CaIrO3in the form of thin films grown on SrTiO3, employing a combination of ab-initio tools and resonant inelastic X-ray scattering. Our results indicate that the films likely lie in the antiferromagnetic semimetallic regime, with an ordering temperature that is, surprisingly, well above the room temperature. In this talk, our findings will be discussed in connection to the structural and transport properties of the material.