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Creators/Authors contains: "Walters, Lauren N"

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  1. Polar metals have recently garnered increasing interest because of their promising functionalities. Here we report the experimental realization of an intrinsic coexisting ferromagnetism, polar distortion and metallicity in quasi-two-dimensional Ca3Co3O8. This material crystallizes with alternating stacking of oxygen tetrahedral CoO4 monolayers and octahedral CoO6 bilayers. The ferromagnetic metallic state is confined within the quasi-two-dimensional CoO6 layers, and the broken inversion symmetry arises simultaneously from the Co displacements. The breaking of both spatial-inversion and time-reversal symmetries, along with their strong coupling, gives rise to an intrinsic magnetochiral anisotropy with exotic magnetic field-free non-reciprocal electrical resistivity. An extraordinarily robust topological Hall effect persists over a broad temperature–magnetic field phase space, arising from dipole-induced Rashba spin–orbit coupling. Our work not only provides a rich platform to explore the coupling between polarity and magnetism in a metallic system, with extensive potential applications, but also defines a novel design strategy to access exotic correlated electronic states. 
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  2. Abstract A bimetallic hydroxychalcogenide, BaZn2Se2(OH)2, was synthesized through hydrothermal pouch methods. The single crystal X‐ray diffraction and electron diffraction indicates that the phase crystallizes in the orthorhombic space groupPnmaand is composed of anionic layers [ZnSe3/3(OH)1/1]that are separated and charged balanced by Ba2+cations. The [ZnSe3/3(OH)1/1]layer comprises two unique Zn sites, which form interpenetrating zigzag chains with an in‐plane dipole moment and adopts a brownmillerite‐type structural motif. The adjacent layers contain tetrahedrally coordinated Zn chains of opposite handedness related by an inversion center, which cancel the microscopic dipoles to minimize the macroscopic electric polarization. The adoption of a brownmillerite structural motif in BaZn2Se2(OH)2can be rationalized by the distinct charge difference between Se2−and OHanions, which creates a sufficient dipole moment in the ZnSe3(OH) tetrahedra to allow the occurrence of twisted chains. FTIR spectroscopy confirms the existence of OHanions and DFT calculations indicate that BaZn2Se2(OH)2is a semiconductor with a direct band gap. This work expands the chemistry of the brownmillerite family from traditional homoanionic oxides to multianion hydroxychalcogenides, offering a new opportunity to explore tunable structural complexity for better design of functional materials. 
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