The concept of geometrical frustration in condensed matter physics refers to the fact that a system has a locally preferred structure with an energy density lower than the infinite ground state. This notion is however often used in a qualitative sense only. In this article, we discuss a quantitative definition of geometrical frustration in the context of lattice models of binary spins. To this aim, we introduce the framework of local energy landscapes, within which frustration can be quantified as the discrepancy between the energy of locally preferred structures and the ground state. Our definition is scale-dependent and involves an optimization over a gauge class of equivalent local energy landscapes, related to one another by local energy displacements. This ensures that frustration depends only on the physical Hamiltonian and its range, and not on unphysical choices in how it is written. Our framework shows that a number of popular frustrated models, including the antiferromagnetic Ising model on a triangular lattice, only have finite-range frustration: geometrical incompatibilities are local and can be eliminated by an exact coarse-graining of the local energies.
The smallest maximum kissing-number Voronoi polyhedron of 3d spheres is the icosahedron and the tetrahedron is the smallest volume that can show up in Delaunay tessalation. No periodic lattice is consistent with either and hence these dense packings are geometrically frustrated. Because icosahedra can be assembled from almost perfect tetrahedra, the terms "icosahedral" and "polytetrahedral" packing are often used interchangeably, which leaves the true origin of geometric frustration unclear. Here we report a computational study of freezing of 4d hard spheres, where the densest Voronoi cluster …
We examine a simple hard disc fluid with no long range interactions on the two dimensional space of constant negative Gaussian curvature, the hyperbolic plane. This geometry provides a natural mechanism by which global crystalline order is frustrated, allowing us to construct a tractable model of disordered monodisperse hard discs. We extend free area theory and the virial expansion to this regime, deriving the equation of state for the system, and compare its predictions with simulation near an isostatic packing in the curved space. Additionally, we investigate packing and dynamics on triply …
We analytically and numerically characterize the structure of hard-sphere fluids in order to review various geometrical frustration scenarios of the glass transition. We find generalized polytetrahedral order to be correlated with increasing fluid packing fraction, but to become increasingly irrelevant with increasing dimension. We also find the growth in structural correlations to be modest in the dynamical regime accessible to computer simulations.
We introduce a hard-core lattice-gas model on generalized Bethe lattices and investigate analytically and numerically its compaction behavior. If compactified slowly, the system undergoes a first-order crystallization transition. If compactified much faster, the system stays in a meta-stable liquid state and undergoes a glass transition under further compaction. We show that this behavior is induced by geometrical frustration which appears due to the existence of short loops in the generalized Bethe lattices. We also compare our results to numerical simulations of a three-dimensional analog of…
Making use of detailed classical Monte Carlo simulations, we study the critical properties of a two dimensional planar spin model on a square lattice composed by weakly interacting helimagnetic chains. We find a large temperature window where the vector chirality order parameter, <k_{jk}>=<S_j x S_k>, the key quantity in multiferroic systems, takes nonzero value in absence of long-range order or quasi-long-range order, so that, our model is the first example where, at finite temperatures, a vector chiral spin liquid phase in absence of geometrical frustration is explicitly reported. We also sh…
We study the phase diagram of a topological string-net type lattice model in the presence of geometrically frustrated interactions. These interactions drive several phase transitions that reduce the topological order, leading to a rich phase diagram including both Abelian ($\mathbb{Z}_2$) and non-Abelian ($\text{Ising}\times \overline{\text{Ising}}$) topologically ordered phases, as well as phases with broken translational symmetry. Interestingly, one of these phases simultaneously exhibits (Abelian) topological order and long-ranged order due to translational symmetry breaking, with non-trivi…
Geometric frustration arises when lattice structure prevents simultaneous minimization of local interactions. It leads to highly degenerate ground states and, subsequently, complex phases of matter such as water ice, spin ice and frustrated magnetic materials. Here we report a simple geometrically frustrated system composed of closely packed colloidal spheres confined between parallel walls. Diameter-tunable microgel spheres are self-assembled into a buckled triangular lattice with either up or down displacements analogous to an antiferromagnetic Ising model on a triangular lattice. Experiment…
Herein, fundamentals of topology and symmetry breaking are used to understand crystallization and geometrical frustration in topologically close-packed structures. This frames solidification from a new perspective that is unique from thermodynamic discussions. Crystallization is considered as developing from undercooled liquids, in which orientational order is characterized by a surface of a sphere in four-dimensions (quaternion) with the binary polyhedral representation of the preferred orientational order of atomic clustering inscribed on its surface. As a consequence of the dimensionality o…
Geometric frustration leads to complex phases of matter with exotic properties. Antiferromagnets on triangular lattices and square ice are two simple models of geometrical frustration. We map their highly degenerated ground-state phase spaces as discrete networks such that network analysis tools can be introduced to phase-space studies. The resulting phase spaces establish a novel class of complex networks with Gaussian spectral densities. Although phase-space networks are heterogeneously connected, the systems are still ergodic except under periodic boundary conditions. We elucidate the bound…
We study the frustration properties of the Ising model on several decorated lattices with arbitrary numbers of decorating spins on all bonds of the lattice within an exact analytical approach based on the Kramers--Wannier transfer-matrix technique. The existence of magnetic frustrations in such situations and their influence on the behavior of the thermodynamic functions of systems is shown. The most important result of our study is related to the description of the possible coexistence of frustrations and long-range magnetic order in partially ordered spin systems.
A new quantum spin model with frustration, the `Union Jack' model on the square lattice, is analyzed using spin-wave theory. For small values of the frustrating coupling $α$, the system is N{\' e}el ordered as usual, while for large $α$ the frustration is found to induce a canted phase. The possibility of an intermediate spin-liquid phase is discussed.
The frustration phenomenon in an exactly solvable spin-electron planar model constituted by identical bipyramidal plaquettes is discussed within the Toulouse's and dos Santos and Lyra's frustration concepts. It is shown that the ground state of the model contains the unfrustrated spontaneously ordered quantum ferromagnetic phase with local chiral degrees of freedom in the electron sub-lattice and the disordered quantum one, where both the Ising and electron sub-lattices are frustrated. The frustration of the latter sub-lattice persists at finite temperatures, but only in the disordered region.…
We develop a novel method based in the sparse random graph to account the interplay between geometric frustration and disorder in cluster magnetism. Our theory allows to introduce the cluster network connectivity as a controllable parameter. Two types of inner cluster geometry are considered: triangular and tetrahedral. The theory was developed for a general, non-uniform intra-cluster interactions, but in the present paper the results presented correspond to uniform, anti-ferromagnetic (AF) intra-clusters interactions $J_{0}/J$. The clusters are represented by nodes on a finite connectivity ra…
Magnetizations of ferro- and antiferromagnetic Ising models with frustration on diamond hierarchical lattices are exactly obtained at zero temperature. For the zero-field classical spin-liquid phase found in [Kobayashi {\it et al}, J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 78, 074004 (2009) ], for which frustrating interactions play an important role, an infinitely small applied magnetic field can induce an infinitely small magnetization, despite classical Ising models that have discrete energy levels. In antiferromagnetic systems, the magnetization cannot saturate under finite magnetic fields owing to the competiti…
We introduce a lattice model with local U(1) gauge symmetry which incorporates explicit frustration in d >2. The form of the action is inspired from the loop expansion of the fermionic determinant in standard lattice QED. We study through numerical simulations the phase diagram of the model, revealing the existence of a frustrated (antiferromagnetic) phase for d=3 and d=4, once an appropriate order parameter is identified.
The spin-1/2 Ising model with a spin-phonon coupling on decorated planar lattices partially amenable to lattice vibrations is examined within the framework of the generalized decoration-iteration transformation and the harmonic approximation. It is shown that the magnetoelastic coupling gives rise to an effective antiferromagnetic next-nearest-neighbour interaction, which competes with the nearest-neighbour interaction and is responsible for a frustration of the decorating spins. The strong enough spin-phonon coupling consequently leads to an appearance of the striking partially ordered and pa…
The mixed spin-(1/2, 3/2) Ising model on a decorated square lattice, which takes into account lattice vibrations of the spin-3/2 decorating magnetic ions at a quantum-mechanical level under the assumption of a perfect lattice rigidity of the spin-1/2 nodal magnetic ions, is examined via an exact mapping correspondence with the effective spin-1/2 Ising model on a square lattice. Although the considered magnetic structure is in principle unfrustrated due to bipartite nature of a decorated square lattice, the model under investigation may display anomalous spin frustration driven by a magnetoelas…
Magnetization processes of Ising models with frustration on diamond hierarchical lattices, which contain vertices with high coordination numbers, are exactly obtained at zero temperature. In antiferromagnetic systems, the magnetization cannot saturate under finite magnetic fields owing to the competition between the antiferromagnetic and Zeeman interactions and the intrinsic long-range nature of hierarchical lattices. For the zero-field classical spin-liquid phase found in [Kobayashi et al., J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 78, 074004 (2009)], an infinitely small applied magnetic field can induce an infinit…
We investigate a possible relation between frustration and phase-transition points in spin glasses. The relation is represented as a condition of the number of frustrated plaquettes in the lattice at phase-transition points at zero temperature and was reported to provide very close points to the phase-transition points for several lattices. Although there has been no proof of the relation, the good correspondence in several lattices suggests the validity of the relation and some important role of frustration in the phase transitions. To examine the relation further, we present a natural extens…
Signed networks with positive and negative interaction are widely observed in the real systems. The negative links would induce frustration, then affect global properties of the system. Based on previous studies, frustration of signed networks is investigated and quantified. Frustrations of $\pm J$ (Edwards-Anderson) Ising model with a concentration $p$ of negative bonds, constructed on different networks, such as triangular lattice, square lattice and random regular networks (RRN) with connectivity $k=6$ are estimated by theoretical and numerical approaches. Based on the quantitative measurem…
We study multilayer triangular lattice Ising antiferromagnets with interlayer interactions that are weak and frustrated in an abc stacking. By analysing a coupled height model description of these systems, we show that they exhibit a classical spin liquid regime at low temperature, in which both intralayer and interlayer correlations are strong but there is no long range order. Diffuse scattering in this regime is concentrated on a helix in reciprocal space, as observed for charge-ordering in the materials LuFe$_2$O$_4$ and YbFe$_2$O$_4$.
In the Sznajd model of 2000, a pair of neighbouring agents on a square lattice convinces its six neighbours of the pair opinion iff the two agents of the pair share the same opinion. Now we replace the usual random sequential updating rule by simultaneous updating and find that this change makes a complete consenus much more difficult. The larger the lattice is, the higher must be the initial majority for one of the two competing opinions to become the consensus.
We predict and observed novel highly anisotropic magnetic patterns obtained in the model of frustrated planar interacting magnetic moments (the classical $X-Y$ model) on the regular kagome lattice. The frustration is provided by the presence of both ferromagnetic and anti-ferromagnetic interactions between adjacent magnetic moments defined on the lattice nodes. At the critical value of the frustration $f=f_{cr}=3/4$ such a systems displays the phase transition from the ordered ferromagnetic state to the disordered frustration regime characterized by the highly-degenerated ground state. In the …
Thermodynamic properties of cubic Heisenberg ferromagnets with competing exchange interactions are considered near the frustration point where the coefficient $D$ in the spin-wave spectrum $E_{\mathbf{k}}\sim D k^{2}$ vanishes. Within the Dyson-Maleev formalism it is found that at low temperatures thermal fluctuations stabilize ferromagnetism by increasing the value of $D$. For not too strong frustration this leads to an unusual "concave" shape of the temperature dependence of magnetization, which is in agreement with experimental data on the europium chalcogenides. The phase diagram is constr…
The classical Heisenberg antiferromagnet on a triangular lattice with the single-ion anisotropy of the easy-axis type is theoretically investigated. The mean-field phase diagram in an external magnetic field is constructed. Three finite-temperature Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless transitions are found by the Monte Carlo simulations in zero field. The two upper transitions are related to the breaking of the discrete ${\mathbb Z}_{6}$ symmetry group, while the lowest transition is associated with a quasi-long-range ordering of transverse components. The intermediate collinear phase between first…
In the dense metal-organic framework Na[Mn(HCOO)$_3$], Mn$^{2+}$ ions ($S=\frac{5}{2}$) occupy the nodes of a `trillium' hyperkagome net. We show that this material exhibits a variety of behaviour characteristic of geometric frustration: the Néel transition is suppressed well below the characteristic magnetic interaction strength; short-range magnetic order persists far above the Néel temperature; and the magnetic susceptibility exhibits a pseudo-plateau at $\frac{1}{3}$-saturation magnetisation. We demonstrate that a simple nearest-neighbour Heisenberg antiferromagnet model accounts quantitat…
We conjecture the existence of a relationship between frustration and the transition point at zero temperature of Ising spin glasses. The relation reveals that, in several Ising spin glass models, the concentration of ferromagnetic bonds is close to the critical concentration at zero temperature when the output of a function about frustration is equal to unity. The function is the derivative of the average number of frustrated plaquettes with respect to the average number of antiferromagnetic bonds. This relation is conjectured in Ising spin glasses with binary couplings on two-dimensional lat…
Hastings established exponential decay of correlations for ground states of gapped quantum many-body systems. A ground state of a (geometrically) local Hamiltonian with spectral gap $ε$ has correlation length $ξ$ upper bounded as $ξ=O(1/ε)$. In general this bound cannot be improved. Here we study the scaling of the correlation length as a function of the spectral gap in frustration-free local Hamiltonians, and we prove a tight bound $ξ=O(1/\sqrtε)$ in this setting. This highlights a fundamental difference between frustration-free and frustrated systems near criticality. The result is obtained …
"Three is a crowd" is an old proverb that applies as much to social interactions, as it does to frustrated configurations in statistical physics models. Accordingly, social relations within a triangle deserve special attention. With this motivation, we explore the impact of topological frustration on the evolutionary dynamics of the snowdrift game on a triangular lattice. This topology provides an irreconcilable frustration, which prevents anti-coordination of competing strategies that would be needed for an optimal outcome of the game. By using different strategy updating protocols, we observ…
The S = 1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the two-dimensional pyramid lattice is studied by the numerical-diagonalization method. This lattice is obtained by the combination of the Lieb lattice and the square lattice. It is known that when interaction on the square lattice is increased from the ferrimagnetic limit of strong interaction on the Lieb lattice, this system shows gradual decrease and disappearance of spontaneous magnetization in the ground state. The present study treats the region near the case of the square-lattice antiferromagnet accompanied by isolated spins by numerical-diagona…
