Helicoidal ordering in iron perovskites

We study the double exchange in transition metal oxides with itinerant and localized electrons. We show that the charge transfer energy Delta and the oxygen-oxygen hopping amplitude t(pp) have a strong effect on magnetic ordering: while for Delta>0 the ground state is ferromagnetic, for negative Delta and large t(pp) the double exchange gives rise to an incommensurate helicoidal ordering of local spins, observed, e.g., in the iron perovskites SrFeO3 and CaFeO3. For negative Delta, the metal-insulator transition into a charge-ordered state has little effect on magnetic ordering. This explains the difference in magnetic and transport properties of ferrates and manganites.