Gapless spin liquids: Stability and possible experimental relevance

Abstract

For certain crystalline systems, most notably the organic compound EtMe3Sb[Pd(dmit)2]2, experimental evidence has accumulated of an insulating state with a high density of gapless neutral excitations that produce Fermi-liquid-like power laws in thermodynamic quantities and thermal transport. This has been taken as evidence of a fractionalized spin liquid state. In this paper, we argue that if the experiments are taken at face value, the most promising spin liquid candidates are a Z4 spin liquid with a pseudo-Fermi surface and no broken symmetries, or a Z2 spin-liquid with a pseudo-Fermi surface and at least one of the following spontaneously broken: (a) time-reversal and inversion, (b) translation, or (c) certain point-group symmetries. We present a solvable model on the triangular lattice with an (a) type Z2 spin liquid groundstate.