Effects of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction in Cr-3 triangular spin clusters detected by specific heat and multi-frequency electron spin resonance

An oxo-centered [Cr3O(O(2)CtBu)(6)(H2O)(3)]((O2CBu)-Bu-t) HO(2)CtBu center dot 2EtOH triangular cluster has been synthesized and its magnetic properties have been studied by means of complementary techniques, namely magnetometry, specific heat and multi-frequency Electron Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR). Measurements on oriented single-crystals evidenced the presence of anisotropy that we attributed to the combined effect of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya exchange interaction and distortion. By means of a minimal set of parameters, we show that a simple analytical model well describes the main features of the full set of experimental data.