Spin-0 Mott insulator to metal to spin-1 Mott insulator transition in the single-orbital Hubbard model on the decorated honeycomb lattice

Abstract

We study the interplay of strong electron correlations and intratriangle spin exchange at two-thirds filling of the single-orbital Hubbard model on the decorated honeycomb lattice using rotationally invariant slave bosons. We find that the spin exchange tunes between a spin-1 Mott insulator, a metal, and a spin-0 Mott insulator when the exchange is antiferromagnetic. The Mott insulators occur from effective intratriangle multiorbital interactions and are adiabatically connected to the ground state of an isolated triangle. An antiferromagnetic spin exchange, as determined by the Goodenough-Kanamori rules, may occur in coordination polymers from kinetic exchange via the ligands. We characterize the magnetism in the regime where spin triplets dominate. For small $U$ a spin-1 Slater insulator occurs with antiferromagnetic order between triangles. Magnetism in the spin-1 Mott insulator is described by a spin-1 Heisenberg model on a honeycomb lattice, whose ground state is N\'eel ordered.