Heisenberg Antiferromagnet Research Articles

Precise spin-wave model for one-, two-, and three-dimensional Heisenberg antiferromagnets inclusive of dipolar interactions

Precise spin-wave model for one-, two-, and three-dimensional Heisenberg antiferromagnets inclusive of dipolar interactions

Construction of Ideal One-Dimensional Spin Chains by Topochemical Dehydration/Rehydration Route.

One-dimensional (1D) Heisenberg antiferromagnets are of great interest due to their intriguing quantum phenomena. However, the experimental realization of such systems with large spin S remains challenging because even weak interchain interactions induce long-range ordering. In this study, we present an ideal 1D S = 5/2 spin chain antiferromagnet achieved through a multistep topochemical route involving dehydration and rehydration. By desorbing three water molecules from (2,2'-bpy)FeF3(H2O)·2H2O (2,2'-bpy = 2,2'-bipyridyl) at 150 °C and then intercalating two water molecules at room temperature (giving (2,2'-bpy)FeF3·2H2O 1), the initially isolated FeF3ON2 octahedra combine to form corner-sharing FeF4N2 octahedral chains, which are effectively separated by organic and added water molecules. Mössbauer spectroscopy reveals significant dynamical fluctuations down to 2.7 K, despite the presence of strong intrachain interactions. Moreover, results from electron spin resonance (ESR) and heat capacity measurements indicate the absence of long-range order down to 0.5 K. This controlled topochemical dehydration/rehydration approach is further extended to (2,2'-bpy)CrF3·2H2O with S = 3/2 1D chains, thus opening the possibility of obtaining other low-dimensional spin lattices.

Field-controlled multicritical behavior and emergent universality in fully frustrated quantum magnets

Phase transitions in condensed matter are a source of exotic emergent properties. We study the fully frustrated bilayer Heisenberg antiferromagnet to demonstrate that an applied magnetic field creates a previously unknown emergent criticality. The quantum phase diagram contains four states with distinctly different symmetries, all but one pair separated by first-order transitions. We show by quantum Monte Carlo simulations that the thermal phase diagram is dominated by a wall of discontinuities extending between the dimer-triplet phases and the singlet-containing phases. This wall is terminated at finite temperatures by a critical line, which becomes multicritical where the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) transition of the dimer-triplet antiferromagnet and the thermal Ising transition of the singlet-triplet crystal phase also terminate. The combination of merging symmetries leads to a 4-state Potts universality not contained in the microscopic Hamiltonian, which we interpret within the Ashkin-Teller model. Our results represent a systematic step in understanding emergent phenomena in quantum magnetic materials, including the “Shastry-Sutherland compound” SrCu2(BO3)2.

Giant Parametric Amplification of the Inverse Cotton–Mouton Effect in Antiferromagnetic Crystals

The interaction of light with spins in a Heisenberg antiferromagnet with a negligibly low magnetic anisotropy as in RbMnF3 has been theoretically analyzed. In particular, an optical pump–probe experiment, where coherent terahertz magnons are excited by short pump laser pulses in the antiferromagnet and are then detected by a probe pulse delayed with respect to the pump pulse, has been simulated. It has been shown that the giant increase in the intensity of excitation of terahertz magnons under the influence of the inverse Cotton–Mouton effect occurs near parametric resonance, i.e., in the parametric instability region.

The dilute 3D and three site dimer Heisenberg antiferromagnet: review of some magnetic properties.

Many properties of the spin–½ kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet remains controversial and receiving continuous attention from theorists and experimentalists due to their fascinating magnetic properties and high heterogeneity coax by the geometrical frustration. In this research we seek and compare the results obtained in our recent article [1] with that of Napel[2] where we elucidate some of the identified magnetic behaviour using the spin–½ Heisenbeg model with the application of Exact Diagonalization and classical Monte-Carlo simulation on three site dimer and 3D simple cubic lattice simulation. The results obtained shows excellent agreement in both papers reviewed with [1] establishing firmly the FM to AFM transition, having a clear transition point referred to mixed phased [2].

Possible chiral spin liquid state in the S = 1/2 kagome Heisenberg model

The nature of the ground state for the S = 1/2 Kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet (KHAF) has been elusive. We revisit this challenging problem and provide numerical evidence that its ground state is a chiral spin liquid. Combining the density matrix renormalization group method with analytical analyses, we demonstrate that the previously observed chiral spin liquid phase in the KHAF with longer-range couplings is stable in a broader region of the phase diagram. We characterize the nature of the ground state by computing energy derivatives, revealing the ground-state degeneracy arising from the spontaneous breaking of the time-reversal symmetry, and targeting the semion sector. We further investigate the phase diagram in the vicinity of the KHAF and observe a 3×3\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\sqrt{3}\ imes \\sqrt{3}$$\\end{document} magnetically ordered phase and two valence-bond crystal phases.

Candidate quantum disordered intermediate phase in the Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the maple-leaf lattice

Candidate quantum disordered intermediate phase in the Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the maple-leaf lattice

Anomalous scaling corrections and quantum phase diagram of the Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the spatially anisotropic honeycomb lattice

Anomalous scaling corrections and quantum phase diagram of the Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the spatially anisotropic honeycomb lattice

Quantum spin nematic phase in a square-lattice iridate.

Spin nematic is a magnetic analogue of classical liquid crystals, a fourth state of matter exhibiting characteristics of both liquid and solid1,2. Particularly intriguing is a valence-bond spin nematic3-5, in which spins are quantum entangled to form a multipolar order without breaking time-reversal symmetry, but its unambiguous experimental realization remains elusive. Here we establish a spin nematic phase in the square-lattice iridate Sr2IrO4, which approximately realizes a pseudospin one-half Heisenberg antiferromagnet in the strong spin-orbit coupling limit6-9. Upon cooling, the transition into the spin nematic phase at TC ≈ 263 K is marked by a divergence in the static spin quadrupole susceptibility extracted from our Raman spectra and concomitant emergence of a collective mode associated with the spontaneous breaking of rotational symmetries. The quadrupolar order persists in the antiferromagnetic phase below TN ≈ 230 K and becomes directly observable through its interference with the antiferromagnetic order in resonant X-ray diffraction, which allows us to uniquely determine its spatial structure. Further, we find using resonant inelastic X-ray scattering a complete breakdown of coherent magnon excitations at short-wavelength scales, suggesting a many-body quantum entanglement in the antiferromagnetic state10,11. Taken together, our results reveal a quantum order underlying the Néel antiferromagnet that is widely believed to be intimately connected to the mechanism of high-temperature superconductivity12,13.

Spin gap in quasi-one-dimensional S = 3/2 antiferromagnet CoTi2O5

Quasi-one-dimensional (1D) antiferromagnets are known to display intriguing phenomena especially when there is a spin gap in their spin-excitation spectra. Here we demonstrate that a spin gap exists in the quasi-1D Heisenberg antiferromagnet CoTi2O5 with highly ordered Co2+/Ti4+ occupation, in which the Co2+ ions with S = 3/2 form a 1D spin chain along the a-axis. CoTi2O5 undergoes an antiferromagnetic transition at T N ∼ 24 K and exhibits obvious anisotropic magnetic susceptibility even in the paramagnetic region. Although a gapless magnetic ground state is usually expected in a quasi-1D Heisenberg antiferromagnet with half-integer spins, by analyzing the specific heat, the thermal conductivity, and the spin-lattice relaxation rate (1/T 1) as a function of temperature, we found that a spin gap is opened in the spin-excitation spectrum of CoTi2O5 around T N, manifested by the rapid decrease of magnetic specific heat to zero, the double-peak characteristic in thermal conductivity, and the exponential decay of 1/T 1 below T N. Both the magnetic measurements and the first-principles calculations results indicate that there is spin-orbit coupling in CoTi2O5, which induces the magnetic anisotropy in CoTi2O5, and then opens the spin gap at low temperature.

Complete field-induced spectral response of the spin-1/2 triangular-lattice antiferromagnet CsYbSe2

Fifty years after Anderson’s resonating valence-bond proposal, the spin-1/2 triangular-lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnet (TLHAF) remains the ultimate platform to explore highly entangled quantum spin states in proximity to magnetic order. Yb-based delafossites are ideal candidate TLHAF materials, which allow experimental access to the full range of applied in-plane magnetic fields. We perform a systematic neutron scattering study of CsYbSe2, first proving the Heisenberg character of the interactions and quantifying the second-neighbor coupling. We then measure the complex evolution of the excitation spectrum, finding extensive continuum features near the 120°-ordered state, throughout the 1/3-magnetization plateau and beyond this up to saturation. We perform cylinder matrix-product-state (MPS) calculations to obtain an unbiased numerical benchmark for the TLHAF and spectacular agreement with the experimental spectra. The measured and calculated longitudinal spectral functions reflect the role of multi-magnon bound and scattering states. These results provide valuable insight into unconventional field-induced spin excitations in frustrated quantum materials.

Frustrated magnetism of the spin-1 kagome antiferromagnet β-BaNi3(VO4)2(OH)2

We propose the newly synthesized β-BaNi3(VO4)2(OH)2 (space group: ) as a candidate for the spin-1 kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet (KHA). The compound features a uniform kagome lattice of Ni2+ (S = 1) ions with a large interlayer distance. High-field measurements at low temperatures reveal a susceptibility local minimum at ∼9 T, resembling a 1/3 magnetization plateau as predicted by the pure S = 1 KHA model. Below ∼6 K, approximately 1% of the spins exhibit spin-glass order, which may be attributed to the nanocrystalline grain size of ∼50 nm. Despite the antiferromagnetic exchange coupling strength of ∼7 K, the majority of spins remain disordered down to ∼0.1 K as indicated by the observed power-law behaviors in magnetic specific heat . Our results demonstrate that the low-energy magnetic excitations in β-BaNi3(VO4)2(OH)2 are gapless, which contradicts the current theoretical expectations of the ideal model.

Abundance of Hard-Hexagon Crystals in the Quantum Pyrochlore Antiferromagnet.

We propose a simple family of valence-bond crystals as potential ground states of the S=1/2 and S=1 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the pyrochlore lattice. Exponentially numerous in the linear size of the system, these can be visualized as hard-hexagon coverings, with each hexagon representing a resonating valence-bond ring. This ensemble spontaneously breaks rotation, inversion, and translation symmetries. A simple, yet accurate, variational wave function allows a precise determination of the energy, confirmed by the density matrix renormalization group and numerical linked cluster expansion, and extended by an analysis of excited states. The identification of the origin of the stability indicates applicability to a broad class of frustrated lattices, which we demonstrate for the checkerboard and ruby lattices. Our work suggests a perspective on such quantum magnets, in which unfrustrated motifs are effectively uncoupled by the frustration of their interactions.

Magnetic properties of Cu[C6H2(COO)4][H3N–(CH2)2–NH3]·3H2O - A quasi-two-dimensional S = 1/2 antiferromagnet on rectangular lattice

The analysis of specific heat, magnetic susceptibility and magnetization identified the studied compound Cu[C6H2(COO)4][H3N–(CH2)2–NH3]·3H2O as a quasi-two-dimensional S = 1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the rectangular lattice with the intrachain coupling J1/kB≈ 7.39 K and the interaction ratio R ≈ 0.44. A phase transition to a magnetically ordered state was observed in zero magnetic field at TN = 1.28 K. The analysis of magnetic specific heat in non-zero magnetic fields revealed features characteristic of the field-induced Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless phase transition theoretically predicted for ideal two-dimensional magnets. The electron paramagnetic resonance studies of Cu[C6H2(COO)4][H3N–(CH2)2–NH3]·3H2O revealed the increase of gx and gy and decrease of gz below 25 K due to the presence of dipolar coupling and the exchange anisotropy. The upturn of linewidth appearing below 30 K can be ascribed to the development of intralayer magnetic correlations.

Special transition and extraordinary phase on the surface of a two-dimensional quantum Heisenberg antiferromagnet

Continuous phase transitions exhibit richer critical phenomena on the surface than in the bulk, because distinct surface universality classes can be realized at the same bulk critical point by tuning the surface interactions. The exploration of surface critical behavior provides a window looking into higher-dimensional boundary conformal field theories. In this work, we study the surface critical behavior of a two-dimensional (2D) quantum critical Heisenberg model by tuning the surface coupling strength, and discover a direct special transition on the surface from the ordinary phase into an extraordinary phase. The extraordinary phase has a long-range antiferromagnetic order on the surface, in sharp contrast to the logarithmic decaying spin correlations in the 3D classical O(3) model. The special transition point has a new set of critical exponents, y_{s}=0.86(4)ys=0.86(4) and \eta_{\parallel}=-0.33(1)η∥=−0.33(1), which are distinct from the special transition of the classical O(3) model and indicate a new surface universality class of the 3D O(3) Wilson-Fisher theory.

Nature of the 1/9-magnetization plateau in the spin- 12 kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet

The nature of the 1/9-magnetization plateau of the spin-1/2 kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet remains controversial due to the exotic physical properties and high complexity induced by the geometrical frustration. Instead of a Z3 quantum spin liquid revealed on a cylinder, we show on an infinite-size lattice that the 1/9 plateau can be described by a valence bond crystal (VBC) that breaks spatial translational invariance. Consistent results are achieved by two accurate tensor network methods, namely the full-update infinite projected-entangled pair states and the projected-entangled simplex states. The VBC exhibits an hourglass pattern with $\sqrt{3}\times\sqrt{3}$ spatial symmetry, demonstrated by magnetizations, bond energies, and three-body correlators. The spatial inversion symmetry in the $\sqrt{3}\times\sqrt{3}$ VBC is instantly broken with the presence of the difference between the coupling strengths in the up and down triangles, suggesting the existence of gapless excitations. The gapless nature of the 1/9 plateau is further indicated by the scaling behaviors of the entanglement entropy and the correlation length, which indicate a c=1 conformal field theory.

Magnetism of the S=12 J1−J2 square-kagome lattice antiferromagnet

The spin-$1/2$ Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the square-kagome (SK) lattice has attracted growing attention as a model system of highly frustrated quantum magnetism. A further motivation for theoretical studies comes from the recent discovery of SK spin-liquid compounds. The SK antiferromagnet exhibits two non-equivalent nearest-neighbor bonds $J_1$ and $J_2$. One may expect that in SK compounds $J_1$ and $J_2$ are of different strength. We present a numerical study of finite systems by means of the finite-temperature Lanczos method. We discuss the temperature dependence of the specific heat $C(T)$, the entropy $S(T)$, and of the susceptibility $X(T)$ of the $J_1$-$J_2$ SK Heisenberg antiferromagnet varying $J_2/J_1$ in the range $0 \le J_2/J_1 \le 4$. We also discuss the zero-field ground state of the model. We find indications for a magnetically disordered singlet ground state for $0 \le J_2/J_1 \lesssim 1.65$. Beyond $J_2/J_1 \sim 1.65$ the singlet ground state gives way for a ferrimagnetic ground state. In the region $0.77 \lesssim J_2/J_1 \lesssim 1.65$ the low-temperature thermodynamics is dominated by a finite singlet-triplet gap filled with low-lying singlet excitations leading to an exponentially activated low-temperature behavior of $X(T)$. On the other hand, the low-lying singlets yield an extra maximum or a shoulder-like profile below the main maximum in the $C(T)$ curve. For $J_2/J_1 \lesssim 0.7$ the low-temperature thermodynamics is characterized by a large fraction of $N/3$ weakly coupled spins leading to a sizable amount of entropy at very low temperatures. In an applied magnetic field the magnetization process features plateaus and jumps in a wide range of $J_2/J_1$.

Discrete Laplacian thermostat for spin systems with conserved dynamics

A well-established numerical technique to study the dynamics of spin systems in which symmetries and conservation laws play an important role is to microcanonically integrate their reversible equations of motion, obtaining thermalization through initial conditions drawn with the canonical distribution. In order to achieve a more realistic relaxation of the magnetic energy, numerically expensive methods that explicitly couple the spins to the underlying lattice are normally employed. Here we introduce a stochastic conservative thermostat that relaxes the magnetic energy while preserving the constant of motions, thus turning microcanonical spin dynamics into a conservative canonical dynamics, without actually simulating the lattice. We test the thermostat on the Heisenberg antiferromagnet in $d=3$ and show that the method reproduces the exact values of the static and dynamic critical exponents, while in the low-temperature phase it yields the correct spin wave phenomenology. Finally, we demonstrate that the relaxation coefficient of the new thermostat is quantitatively connected to the microscopic parameters of the spin-lattice coupling.

Thermal features of Heisenberg antiferromagnets on edge- versus corner-sharing triangular-based lattices: a message from spin waves

We propose a new scheme of modifying spin waves so as to describe the thermodynamic properties of various noncollinear antiferromagnets with particular interest in a comparison between edge- versus corner-sharing triangular-based lattices. The well-known modified spin-wave theory for collinear antiferromagnets diagonalizes a bosonic Hamiltonian subject to the constraint that the total staggered magnetization be zero. Applying this scheme to frustrated noncollinear antiferromagnets ends in a poor thermodynamics, missing the optimal ground state and breaking the local U(1) rotational symmetry. We find such a plausible double-constraint condition for spin spirals as to spontaneously go back to the traditional single-constraint condition at the onset of a collinear Néel-ordered classical ground state. We first diagonalize only the bilinear terms in Holstein-Primakoff boson operators on the order of spin magnitude S and then bring these linear spin waves into interaction in a perturbative rather than variational manner. We demonstrate specific-heat calculations in terms of thus-modified interacting spin waves on various triangular-based lattices. In zero dimension, modified-spin-wave findings in comparison with finite-temperature Lanczos calculations turn out so successful as to reproduce the monomodal and bimodal specific-heat temperature profiles of the triangular-based edge-sharing Platonic and corner-sharing Archimedean polyhedral-lattice antiferromagnets, respectively. In two dimensions, high-temperature series expansions and tensor-network-based renormalization-group calculations are still controversial especially at low temperatures, and under such circumstances, modified spin waves interestingly predict that the specific heat of the kagome-lattice antiferromagnet in the corner-sharing geometry remains having both mid-temperature broad maximum and low-temperature narrow peak in the thermodynamic limit, while the specific heat of the triangular-lattice antiferromagnet in the edge-sharing geometry retains a low-temperature sharp peak followed by a mid-temperature weak anormaly in the thermodynamic limit. By further calculating one-magnon spectral functions in terms of our newly developed double-constraint modified spin-wave theory, we reveal that not only the elaborate modification scheme but also quantum corrections, especially those caused by the O(S 0) primary self-energies, are key ingredients in the successful description of triangular-based-lattice noncollinear antiferromagnets over the whole temperature range of absolute zero to infinity.

Bose-Einstein condensation in honeycomb dimer magnets and Yb2Si2O7

An asymmetric Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) dome was observed in a recent experiment on the quantum dimer magnet ${\mathrm{Yb}}_{2}{\mathrm{Si}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{7}\mathrm{e}$ [G. Hester et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 123, 027201 (2019)], which is modeled by a ``breathing'' honeycomb lattice Heisenberg model with possible anisotropies. We report a remarkable agreement between key experimental features and predictions from numerical simulations of the magnetic model. Both critical fields, as well as critical temperatures of the BEC dome, can be accurately captured, as well as the occurrence of two regimes inside the BEC phase. Furthermore, we investigate the role of anisotropies in the exchange coupling and the $g$ tensor. While we confirm a previous proposal that anisotropy can induce a zero-temperature phase transition at magnetic fields smaller than the fully polarizing field strength, we find that this effect becomes negligible at temperatures above the anisotropy scale. Instead, the two regimes inside the BEC dome are found to be due to a nonlinear magnetization behavior of the isotropic breathing honeycomb Heisenberg antiferromagnet. Our analysis is performed by combining the density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method with the finite-temperature techniques of minimally entangled typical thermal states (METTS) and quantum Monte Carlo (QMC).