The role of orbital ordering in the formation of electron structure in undoped LaMnO3 manganites in the regime of strong electron correlations

The electron structure of undoped LaMnO3 and slightly doped La1-xSrxMnO3 manganites has been calculated within the framework of a generalized tight binding method with explicit allowance for strong intra-atomic electron correlations. According to the results of these calculations, the ground state in orbitally disordered undoped LaMnO3 ferromagnets would be metallic despite the Mott-Hubbard correlation gap in the spectrum of quasiparticles. Owing to the orbital ordering, the insulating state is stabilized in both antiferromagnetic and paramagnetic phases. In-gap states of a polaron nature with a spectral weight proportional to the dopant concentration have been found near the top of the valence band in La1-xSrxMnO3. As the doping level increases, a metal state appears in the ferromagnetic phase, which has a metallic character for one spin subband and an insulating character for the other subband (representing the so-called half-metallic state).