Magnetic and magnetodielectric coupling anomalies in the Haldane spin-chain system Nd2BaNiO5

We report the magnetic, heat-capacity, dielectric and magnetodielectric (MDE) behaviour of a Haldane spin-chain compound containing light rare-earth ion, Nd2BaNiO5, in detail, as a function of temperature (T) and magnetic field (H) down to 2 K. In addition to the well-known long range antiferromagnetic order setting in at (TN = ) 48 K as indicated in dc magnetization (M), we have observed another magnetic transition near 10 K; this transition appears to be of a glassy-type which vanishes with a marginal application of external magnetic field (even H = 100 Oe). There are corresponding anomalies in dielectric constant (ε′) as well with variation of T. The isothermal M(H) curves at 2 and 5 K reveal the existence of a magnetic-field induced transition around 90 kOe; the isothermal ε′(H) also tracks such a metamagnetic transition. These results illustrate the MDE coupling in this compound. Additionally, we observe a strong frequency dependence of a step in ε′(T) with this feature appearing around 25-30 K for the lowest frequency of 1 kHz, far below TN. This is attributed to interplay between crystal-field effect and exchange interaction between Nd and Ni, which establishes the sensitivity of dielectric measurements to detect such effects. Interestingly enough, the observed dispersions of the ε′(T) curves is essentially H-independent in the entire T-range of measurement, despite the existence of MDE coupling, which is in sharp contrast with other heavy rare-earth members in this series.