Many of the most remarkable properties of quantum materials come from the interplay of multiple charge, orbital and spin degrees of freedom. Probing all of these with a single technique is consequently highly desirable. In this talk, I will describe how resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) opens up important new possibilities for measuring these degrees of freedom. This includes observing precursor charge density wave correlations in cuprates [1], observing orbital hybridization in iridates [2], and characterizing the spin behavior within the transient state of photo-doped Sr ₂ IrO ₄ [3].

References

1. H. Miao et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A 114, 12430–12435 (2017); H. Miao et al., Phys. Rev. X 8, 011008 (2018); H. Miao et al., Phys. Rev. X 9, 031042 (2019)
2. Y. Wang et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 122, 106401 (2019)
3. M. P. M. Dean et al., Nature Materials 15, 601-605 (2016); Y. Cao et al., Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 377: 20170480 (2019); D. Mazzone et al., in preparation.