“Phonons are known as an important energy carrier and their interaction with electrons is critical for understanding exotic properties in correlated materials. … Chiral phonons arising from circular ionic motions alone would only exhibit a small magnetic moment. In contrast, chiral phonons reported recently in several classes of materials including the pseudogap phase of cuprates and topological semimetals exhibit surprisingly large moments. Here, we report studies of chiral phonons in CoTiO3, a quantum magnet that hosts interesting bosonic excitations such as topological magnons and spin–orbit excitons.”

Find the paper and full list of authors at PNAS.