Gapless quantum spin liquid in the triangular system Sr$_{3}$CuSb$_{2}$O$_{9}$
S. Kundu, Aga Shahee, Atasi Chakraborty, K. M. Ranjith, B. Koo, Jörg Sichelschmidt, Mark T. F. Telling, P. K. Biswas, M. Baenitz, I. Dasgupta, Sumiran Pujari, A. V. Mahajan
备注：
16 pages, 21 figures, including supplementary material. A $S = \frac{1}{2}$ Dirac spin liquid scenario has been put forward to explain the field-dependent specific heat data. Comments are welcome
We report gapless quantum spin liquid behavior in the layered triangular Sr$_{3}$CuSb$_{2}$O$_{9}$ (SCSO) system. X-ray diffraction shows superlattice reflections associated with atomic site ordering into triangular Cu planes well-separated by Sb planes. Muon spin relaxation ($μ$SR) measurements show that the $S = \frac{1}{2}$ moments at the magnetically active Cu sites remain dynamic down to 65 mK in spite of a large antiferromagnetic exchange scale evidenced by a large Curie-Weiss temperature $θ_{\mathrm{cw}} \simeq $ -143 K as extracted from the bulk susceptibility. Specific heat measurements also show no sign of long-range order down to 0.35 K. The magnetic specific heat ($\mathit{C}$$_{\mathrm{m}}$) below 5 K reveals a $\mathit{C}$$_{\mathrm{m}}$ $=$ $γT$ + $αT$$^{2}$ behavior. The significant $T$$^{2}$ contribution to the magnetic specific heat invites a phenomenology in terms of the so-called Dirac spinon excitations with a linear dispersion. From the low-$T$ specific heat data, we estimate the dominant exchange scale to be $\sim $ 36 K using a Dirac spin liquid ansatz which is not far from the values inferred from microscopic density functional theory calculations ($\sim $ 45 K) as well as high-temperature susceptibility analysis ($\sim$ 70 K). The linear specific heat coefficient is about 18 mJ/mol-K$^2$ which is somewhat larger than for typical Fermi liquids.
Inspired by recent measurements on Ba$_3$CuSb$_2$O$_9$, we explore the interplay of spin and orbital degrees of freedom in a triangular lattice for possible spin liquid-like behaviour. Our effective Hamiltonian describes the magnetic Cu layer by considering superexchange paths along the intermediate O's. A mean field study of ordered states reveals an orbitally ordered ground state that isolates the spin degrees of freedom into spin chains. This scenario naturally explains the linear specific heat as $T\to 0$ and, by including the effects of additional defect Cu's sitting off the triangular pl…
The absence of both spin freezing and of a static Jahn-Teller effect have lead to the proposition that Ba$_3$CuSb$_2$O$_9$ is a quantum spin-orbital liquid. However, theoretical understanding of the microscopic origin of this behavior has been hampered by a lack of consensus on the lattice structure. Cu ions have been proposed to realize either a triangular lattice, a short-range ordered honeycomb lattice or a disordered lattice with stripelike correlations. Here we analyze the stability of idealized versions of these arrangements using density functional theory. We find stripe order of Cu ion…
Using elastic and inelastic neutron scattering techniques, we show that upon cooling a spatially anisotropic triangular antiferromagnet Ag$_2$MnO$_2$ freezes below $T_f ~\sim 50$ K into short range collinear state. The static spin correlations are extremely two-dimensional, and the spin fluctuations are gapless with two characteristic relaxation rates that behave linearly with temperature.
We study the ground state properties of the Hubbard model on three-leg triangular cylinders using large-scale density-matrix renormalization group simulations. At half-filling, we identify an intermediate gapless spin liquid phase between a metallic phase at weak coupling and Mott insulating dimer phase at strong interaction, which has one gapless spin mode and algebraic spin-spin correlations but exponential decay scalar chiral-chiral correlations. Upon light doping the gapless spin liquid, the system exhibits power-law charge-density-wave (CDW) correlations but short-range single-particle, s…
We study a three-leg spin-1/2 ladder with geometrically frustrated interleg interactions. We call this model an anisotropic triangular-strip (ATS) model. We numerically and field-theoretically show that its ground state belongs to a gapless symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phase. The numerical approach is based on density-matrix renormalization group analyses of the entanglement entropy and the entanglement spectrum. Whereas the entanglement entropy exhibits a critical behavior, the entanglement spectrum is nontrivially degenerate. These entanglement properties imply that the ground state …
A quantum spin liquid (QSL) is an exotic state in which electron spins are highly entangled, yet keep fluctuating even at zero temperature. Experimental realization of model QSLs has been challenging due to imperfections, such as antisite disorder, strain, and extra or a lack of interactions in real materials compared to the model Hamiltonian. Here we report the magnetic susceptibility, thermodynamic, inelastic neutron scattering (INS), and muon-spin relaxation studies on a polycrystalline sample of PrZnAl$_{11}$O$_{19}$, where the Pr$^{3+}$ ions form an ideal two-dimensional triangular lattic…
We numerically study the Heisenberg models on triangular lattices by extending it from the simplest equilateral lattice with only the nearest-neighbor exchange interaction. We show that, by including an additional weak next-nearest-neighbor interaction, a quantum spin-liquid phase is stabilized against the antiferromagnetic order. The spin gap (triplet excitation gap) and spin correlation at long distances decay algebraically with increasing system size at the critical point between the antiferromagnetic phase and the spin-liquid phase. This algebraic behavior continues in the spin-liquid phas…
The $S=1/2$ kagome- and triangular-lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnets are investigated using the numerical exact diagonalization and the finite-size scaling analysis. The behaviour of the field derivative at zero magnetization is examined for both systems. The present result indicates that the spin excitation is gapless for each system.
We investigate the ground-state and finite-temperature properties of the bond-random $s=1/2$ Heisenberg model on a honeycomb lattice with frustrated nearest- and next-nearest-neighbor antiferromagnetic interactions, $J_1$ and $J_2$, by the exact diagonalization and the Hams--de Raedt methods. The ground-state phase diagram of the model is constructed in the randomness versus the frustration ($J_2/J_1$) plane, with the aim of clarifying the effects of randomness and frustration in stabilizing a variety of distinct phases. We find that the randomness induces the gapless quantum spin liquid (QSL)…
Motivated by the observation of a gapless spin liquid state in $κ$-(BEDT-TTF)$_2$Cu$_2$(CN)$_3$, we analyze the anisotropic triangular lattice $S=1/2$ Heisenberg model with the resonating valence bond mean-field approximation. Paying attention to the small quasi-one-dimensional anisotropy of the material, we take an approach from one-dimensional (1D) chains coupled with frustrating zig-zag bonds. By calculating one-particle excitation spectra changing anisotropy parameter $J'/J$ from the decoupled 1D chains to the isotropic triangular lattice, we find almost gapless excitations in the wide ran…
We consider a SU(3) ring-exchange model on a triangular lattice. Unlike the SU(2) case, under perturbation expansion of the SU(3) Hubbard model, the three-site ring exchange is present as well as the usual four-site ring exchange. Interestingly, the three-site ring exchange differs from the usual two-site and four-site exchanges by a minus sign and is ferromagnetic. We first present numerical site-factorized state studies on this model which shows a three-sublatticed order phase and a ferromagnetic phase. We further study the model using slave-fermion mean field in which we rewrite the exchang…
We present the structural characterization and low-temperature magnetism of the triangular-lattice delafossite NaYbO$_2$. Synchrotron x-ray diffraction and neutron scattering exclude both structural disorder and crystal-electric-field randomness, whereas heat-capacity measurements and muon spectroscopy reveal the absence of magnetic order and persistent spin dynamics down to at least 70\,mK. Continuous magnetic excitations with the low-energy spectral weight accumulating at the $K$-point of the Brillouin zone indicate the formation of a novel spin-liquid phase in a triangular antiferromagnet. …
We study the spin liquid candidate of the spin-$1/2$ $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the triangular lattice by means of density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) simulations. By applying an external Aharonov-Bohm flux insertion in an infinitely long cylinder, we find unambiguous evidence for gapless $U(1)$ Dirac spin liquid behavior. The flux insertion overcomes the finite size restriction for energy gaps and clearly shows gapless behavior at the expected wave-vectors. Using the DMRG transfer matrix, the low-lying excitation spectrum can be extracted, which shows characteristic Dir…
We study the energetics of Gutzwiller projected BCS states of various symmetries for the triangular lattice antiferromagnet with a four particle ring exchange using variational Monte Carlo methods. In a range of parameters the energetically favored state is found to be a projected $d_{x^2-y^2}$ paired state which breaks lattice rotational symmetry. We show that the properties of this nematic or orientationally ordered paired spin liquid state as a function of temperature and pressure can account for many of the experiments on organic materials. We also study the ring-exchange model with ferrom…
We study the interplay of competing interactions in spin-$1/2$ triangular Heisenberg model through tuning the first- ($J_1$), second- ($J_2$), and third-neighbor ($J_3$) couplings. Based on large-scale density matrix renormalization group calculation, we identify a quantum phase diagram of the system and discover a new {\it gapless} chiral spin liquid (CSL) phase in the intermediate $J_2$ and $J_3$ regime. This CSL state spontaneously breaks time-reversal symmetry with finite scalar chiral order, and it has gapless excitations implied by a vanishing spin triplet gap and a finite central charge…
Dynamical dimer structure factor of the triangular $S=1/2$ Heisenberg antiferromagnet
Technische Universität München（慕尼黑工业大学）；Université Libre de Bruxelles（布鲁塞尔自由大学）；Max-Planck-Institut für Physik komplexer Systeme（马克斯·普朗克复杂系统物理研究所）；Munich Center for Quantum Science and Technology (MCQST)（慕尼黑量子科学与技术中心）
We show how a gapless spin liquid with hidden octupolar order arises in an applied magnetic field, in a model applicable to thin films of 3He with competing ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic (cyclic) exchange interactions. Evidence is also presented for nematic -- i.e., quadrupolar -- correlations bordering on ferromagnetism in the absence of a magnetic field.
The standard theoretical approach to gapless spin liquid phases of two-dimensional frustrated quantum antiferromagnets invokes the concept of fermionic slave particles into which the spin fractionalizes. As an alternate we explore new kinds of gapless spin liquid phases in frustrated quantum magnets with XY anisotropy where the vortex of the spin fractionalizes into gapless itinerant fermions. The resulting gapless fractionalized vortex liquid phases are studied within a slave particle framework that is dual to the usual one. We demonstrate the stability of some such phases and describe their …
We present microscopic magnetic properties of a two dimensional triangular lattice Sc2Ga2CuO7, consisting of single and double triangular Cu planes. A Curie-Weiss temperature theta_CW = --44 K and an antiferromagnetic (AFM) exchange interaction J/KB = 35 K between Cu2+ (S = 1/2) spins in the triangular bi-plane are obtained from the analysis of magnetic susceptibility data. The intrinsic magnetic susceptibility extracted from 71Ga NMR shift data displays the presence of AFM short range spin correlations and remains finite down to 50 mK suggesting an non-singlet ground state. The nuclear spin-l…
Recent experiments on triangular lattice organic Mott insulators have found evidence for a 2D spin liquid in proximity to the metal-insulator transition. A Gutzwiller wavefunction study of the triangular lattice Heisenberg model with appropriate four-spin ring exchanges has found that the projected spinon Fermi sea state has a low variational energy. This wavefunction, together with a slave particle gauge theory, suggests that such spin liquid possesses spin correlations that are singular along surfaces in momentum space ("Bose surfaces"). Signatures of this state, which we refer to as a "Spin…
Motivated by multiple possible physical realizations, we study the SU(4) quantum antiferromagnet with a fundamental representation on each site of the triangular lattice. We provide evidence for a gapless liquid ground state of this system with an emergent Fermi surface of fractionalized fermionic partons coupled with a U(1) gauge field. Our conclusions are based on numerical simulations using the density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method, which we support with a field theory analysis.
We study the recently reported characteristic gapless charge ordered state in a spinless fermion system on a triangular lattice under strong inter-site Coulomb interactions. In this state the charges are spontaneously divided into solid and liquid component, and the former solid part aligns in a Wigner crystal manner while the latter moves among them like a pinball. We show that such charge ordered liquid is stable over a wide range of filling, $1/3<n<2/3$, and examine its filling dependent nature.
We study the quantum dimer model on the triangular lattice, which is expected to describe the singlet dynamics of frustrated Heisenberg models in phases where valence bond configurations dominate their physics. We find, in contrast to the square lattice, that there is a truly short ranged resonating valence bond (RVB) phase with no gapless collective excitations and with deconfined, gapped, spinons for a {\it finite} range of parameters. We also establish the presence of three crystalline phases in this system.
In this paper we generalize the fermionic representation for $S=1/2$ spins to arbitrary spins. Within a mean field theory we obtain several spin liquid states for spin $S=1$ antiferromagnets on triangular lattices, including gapless f-wave spin liquid and topologically nontrivial $p_x+ip_y$ spin liquid. After considering different competing orders, we construct a phase diagram for the $J_1$-$J_3$-$K$ model. The application to recently discovered material $\mathrm{NiGa_2S_4}$ is discussed.
The spin liquid state of the antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model on a triangular lattice is studied within the self-consistent Green's function method. It is shown that the spin excitation spectra is gapless, and ground-state energy per site is $E_{g}/NJ=-0.966$, which is in very good agreement with the results obtained within the variational Monte Carlo method based on the resonating-valence-bond state. Some thermodynamic properties are also discussed.
Quantum spin liquid (QSL) is a novel state of matter which refuses the conventional spin freezing even at 0 K. Experimentally searching for the structurally perfect candidates is a big challenge in condensed matter physics. Here we report the successful synthesis of a new spin-1/2 triangular antiferromagnet YbMgGaO$_4$ with R$\bar{3}$m symmetry. The compound with an ideal two-dimensional and spatial isotropic magnetic triangular-lattice has no site-mixing magnetic defects and no antisymmetric Dzyaloshinsky-Moriya (DM) interactions. No spin freezing down to 60 mK (despite $Θ$$_w$ $\sim$ -4 K), …
Despite rapid progress in understanding gapped topological states, much less is known about gapless topological phases of matter, especially in strongly correlated electrons. In this work we discuss a large class of robust gapless quantum spin liquids in frustrated magnets made of half-integer spins, which are described by gapless fermionic spinons coupled to dynamical $Z_2$ gauge fields. Requiring $U(1)$ spin conservation, time reversal and certain space group symmetries, we show that certain spinon symmetry fractionalization class necessarily leads to a gapless spectrum. These gapless excita…
Spin nematic order is investigated for a S=1 spin model on triangular lattice with bilinear-biquadratic interactions. We particularly studied an antiferro nematic order phase with three-sublattice structure, and magnetic properties are calculated at zero temperature by means of bosonization. Two types of bosonic excitations are found. One is a gapless excitation with linear energy dispersion around $k \sim 0$, and this leads to a finite spin susceptibility at T=0 and would have a specific heat $C(T) \sim T^2$ at low temperatures. These behaviors can explain many of characteristic features of r…
The most fascinating feature of certain two-dimensional (2D) gapless quantum spin liquid (QSL) is that their spinon excitations behave like the fermionic carriers of a paramagnetic metal. The spinon Fermi surface is then expected to produce a linear increase of the thermal conductivity with temperature that should manifest via a residual value ($κ_0/T$) in the zero-temperature limit. However, this linear in T behavior has been reported for very few QSL candidates. Here, we studied the ultralow-temperature thermal conductivity of an effective spin-1/2 triangular QSL candidate Na$_2$BaCo(PO$_4$)…
The ground state of the quantum kagome antiferromagnet Zn-brochantite, ZnCu$_3$(OH)$_6$SO$_4$, which is one of only a few known spin-liquid (SL) realizations in two or three dimensions, has been described as a gapless SL with a spinon Fermi surface. Employing nuclear magnetic resonance in a broad magnetic-field range down to millikelvin temperatures, we show that in applied magnetic fields this enigmatic state is intrinsically unstable against a SL with a full or a partial gap. A similar instability of the gapless Fermi-surface SL was previously encountered in an organic triangular-lattice ant…
We propose a novel quantum spin liquid state that can explain many of the intriguing experimental properties of the low-temperature phase of the organic spin liquid candidate materials. This state of paired fermionic spinons preserves all symmetries of the system, and it has a gapless excitation spectrum with quadratic bands that touch at momentum ~ k = 0. This quadratic band touching is protected by the symmetry of the system. Using variational Monte Carlo techniques, we show that this state has highly competitive energy in the triangular lattice Heisenberg model supplemented with a realistic…
Nature of quantum spin liquids of the S=1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the triangular lattice: A parallel DMRG study
School of Physical Science and Technology, ShanghaiTech University（上海科技大学物理科学与技术学院）；Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University（斯坦福材料能源科学研究所、SLAC国家加速器实验室和斯坦福大学）
A quantum spin liquid (QSL) is an exotic state of matter characterized by quantum entanglement and the absence of any broken symmetry. A long-standing open problem, which is a key for fundamental understanding the mysterious QSL states, is how the quantum fluctuations respond to randomness due to quenched disorder. Transition metal dichalcogenide 1T-TaS$_2$ is a candidate material that hosts a QSL ground state with spin-1/2 on the two-dimensional perfect triangular lattice. Here, we performed systematic studies of low-temperature heat capacity and thermal conductivity on pure, Se-substituted a…
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 surfac…
Muon spin relaxation and rotation ($μ$SR) experiments on single crystals of the structurally perfect triangular antiferromagnet YbMgGaO$_4$ indicate the absence of both static long-range magnetic order and spin freezing down to 0.048 K in zero field. Below 0.4 K, the $μ^{+}$ spin relaxation rates, which are proportional to the dynamic correlation function of the Yb$^{3+}$ spins,exhibit temperature-independent plateaus. Same behavior is revealed by temperature-independent local susceptibilities extracted from the Knight shifts of the $μ^{+}$ spin rotation frequencies under a transverse field of…
We show that the spin liquid phase of the half-filled Hubbard model on the triangular lattice can be described by a pure spin model. This is based on a high-order strong coupling expansion (up to order 12) using perturbative continuous unitary transformations. The resulting spin model is consistent with a transition from three-sublattice long-range magnetic order to an insulating spin liquid phase, and with a jump of the double occupancy at the transition. Exact diagonalizations of both models show that the effective spin model is quantitatively accurate well into the spin liquid phase, and a …
Triangular lattice quantum antiferromagnet has recently emerged to be a promising playground for realizing Dirac spin liquids (DSLs) -- a class of highly entangled quantum phases hosting emergent gauge fields and gapless Dirac fermions. While previous theories and experiments focused mainly on $S=1/2$ spin systems, more recently signals of a DSL were detected in an $S=3/2$ system $α$-CrOOH(D). In this work we develop a theory of DSLs on triangular lattice with spin-$S$ moments. We argue that in the most natural scenario, a spin-$S$ system realizes a $U(2S)$ DSL, described at low energy by gapl…
We study the longitudinal excitations of quantum antiferromagnets on a triangular lattice by a recently proposed microscopic many-body approach based on magnon-density waves. We calculate the full longitudinal excitation spectra of the antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model for a general spin quantum number in the isotropic limit. Similar to the square lattice model, we find that, at the center of the first hexagonal Brillouin zone $Γ(\mathbf q=0)$ and at the magnetic ordering wavevectors $\pm[\mathbf Q= (4π/3,0)]$, the excitation spectra become gapless in the thermodynamic limit, due to the slow,…
We report a comprehensive investigation of the magnetism of the $S$ = 3/2 triangular-lattice antiferromagnet, $α$-CrOOH(D) (delafossites green-grey powder). The nearly Heisenberg antiferromagnetic Hamiltonian ($J_1$ $\sim$ 23.5 K) with a weak single-ion anisotropy of $|D|$/$J_1$ $\sim$ 4.6% is quantitatively determined by fitting to the electron spin resonance (ESR) linewidth and susceptibility measured at high temperatures. The weak single-ion anisotropy interactions, possibly along with other perturbations, e.g. next-nearest-neighbor interactions, suppress the long-range magnetic order and r…
Inelastic neutron scattering studies in single crystals of TbInO3 and TbIn0.95Mn0.05O3 with nearly-triangular antiferromagnetic lattice are reported. At low energies, a broad and apparently gapless continuum of magnetic excitations, located at the triangular lattice (TL) Brillouin zone boundary, is observed. The data are well described by the uncorrelated nearest-neighbor valence bonds model. At higher energies, a broad excitation branch dispersing from the TL zone boundary is observed. No signs of static magnetic order are found down to the temperatures two orders of magnitude smaller than th…
Motivated by recent experiments on the material Ba_3NiSb_2O_9 we consider a spin-one quantum antiferromagnet on a triangular lattice with the Heisenberg bilinear and biquadratic exchange interactions and a single-ion anisotropy. Using a fermionic "triplon" representation for spins, we study the phase diagram within mean field theory. In addition to a fully gapped spin-liquid ground state, we find a state where one gapless triplon mode with Fermi surface coexists with d + id topological pairing of the other triplons. Despite the existence of a Fermi surface, this ground state has fully gapped b…
While a quantum spin liquid (QSL) phase has been identified in the $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg model on a triangular lattice via numerical calculations, debate persists about whether or not such a QSL is gapped or gapless, with contradictory conclusions from different techniques. Moreover, information about excitations and dynamics is crucial for the experimental detection of such a phase. In this work, we use exact diagonalization to characterize signatures of a QSL phase on the triangular lattice through the dynamical spin structure factor $\mathcal{S}(q,ω)$ and Raman susceptibility $\mathcalχ(ω)…
Understanding the nature of the excitation spectrum in quantum spin liquids is of fundamental importance, in particular for the experimental detection of candidate materials. However, current theoretical and numerical techniques have limited capabilities, especially in obtaining the dynamical structure factor, which gives a crucial characterization of the ultimate nature of the quantum state and may be directly assessed by inelastic neutron scattering. In this work, we investigate the low-energy properties of the $S=1/2$ Heisenberg model on the triangular lattice, including both nearest-neighb…
To reveal the nature of elementary excitations in a quantum spin liquid (QSL), we measured low temperature thermal conductivity and specific heat of 1T-TaS$_2$, a QSL candidate material with frustrated triangular lattice of spin-1/2. The nonzero temperature linear specific heat coefficient $γ$ and the finite residual linear term of the thermal conductivity in the zero temperature limit $κ_0/T=κ/T(T\rightarrow 0)$ are clearly resolved. This demonstrates the presence of highly mobile gapless excitations, which is consistent with fractionalized spinon excitations that form a Fermi surface. Remark…
We study the effects of bond randomness in the spin-$1/2$ $J_1-J_2$ triangular Heisenberg model using exact diagonalization and density matrix renormalization group. With increasing bond randomness, we identify a randomness induced spin-liquid-like phase without any magnetic order, dimer order, spin glass order, or valence-bond glass order. The finite-size scaling of gaps suggests the gapless nature of both spin triplet and singlet excitations, which is further supported by the broad continuum of dynamical spin structure factor. By studying the bipartite entanglement spectrum of the system on …
Inelastic neutron scattering is used to study the low-energy magnetic excitations in the spin-1 triangular lattice of the 6H-B phase of Ba$_3$NiSb$_2$O$_9$. We study two powder samples: Ba$_3$NiSb$_2$O$_9$ synthesized under high pressure and Ba$_{2.5}$Sr$_{0.5}$NiSb$_2$O$_9$ in which chemical pressure stabilizes the 6H-B structure. The measured excitation spectra show broad gapless and nondispersive continua at characteristic wave vectors. Our data rules out most theoretical scenarios that have previously been proposed for this phase, and we find that it is well described by an exotic quantum …
Motivated by recent experiments on material Ba3NiSb2O9, we propose two novel spin liquid phases (A and B) for spin-1 systems on a triangular lattice. At the mean field level, both spin liquid phases have gapless fermionic spinon excitations with quadratic band touching, thus in both phases the spin susceptibility and C_v/T saturate to a constant at zero temperature, which are consistent with the experimental results on Ba3NiSb2O9. On the lattice scale, these spin liquid phases have Sp(4) ~ SO(5) gauge fluctuation; while in the long wavelength limit this Sp(4) gauge symmetry is broken down to U…
At strong repulsion, the triangular-lattice Hubbard model is described by $s=1/2$ spins with nearest-neighbor antiferromagnetic Heisenberg interactions and exhibits conventional 120$^\circ$ order. Using the infinite density matrix renormalization group and exact diagonalization, we study the effect of the additional four-spin interactions naturally generated from the underlying Mott-insulator physics of electrons as the repulsion decreases. Although these interactions have historically been connected with a gapless ground state with emergent spinon Fermi surface, we find that at physically rel…
Motivated by inelastic neutron scattering data on Cs_2CuCl_4, we explore spin-1/2 triangular lattice antiferromagnets with both spatial and easy-plane exchange anisotropies, the latter due to an observed Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. Exploiting a duality mapping followed by a fermionization of the dual vortex degrees of freedom, we find a novel "critical" spin-liquid phase described in terms of Dirac fermions with an emergent global SU(4) symmetry minimally coupled to a non-compact U(1) gauge field. This ``algebraic vortex liquid" supports gapless spin excitations and universal power-law …
The ruby lattice is a four-valent lattice interpolating between honeycomb and triangular lattices. In this work we investigate the topological spin-liquid phases of a spin Hamiltonian with Kitaev interactions on the ruby lattice using exact diagonalization and perturbative methods. The latter interactions combined with the structure of the lattice yield a model with $\mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_2$ gauge symmetry. We mapped out the phase digram of the model and found gapped and gapless spin-liquid phases. While the low energy sector of the gapped phase corresponds to the well-known topologic…
1T-TaS$_2$ is a cluster Mott insulator on the triangular lattice with 13 Ta atoms forming a star of David cluster as the unit cell. We derive a two dimensional XXZ spin-1/2 model with four-spin ring exchange term to describe the effective low energy physics of a monolayer 1T-TaS$_2$, where the effective spin-1/2 degrees of freedom arises from the Kramers degenerate spin-orbital states on each star of David. A large scale density matrix renormalization group simulation is further performed on this effective model and we find a gapless spin liquid phase with spinon Fermi surface at moderate to l…
We study ring-exchange models for bosons or XY-spins on the triangular lattice. A four-spin exchange leads to a manifold of ground states with gapless excitations and critical power-law correlations. With a nearest-neighbour exchange, fluctuations select a four-fold ferrimagnetically ordered ground state with a small spin/superfluid stiffness which breaks the global U(1) and translational symmetry. We explore consequences for phase transitions at finite temperature and in an in-plane magnetic field.
The effects of pressure on a quantum spin liquid are investigated in an organic Mott insulator $κ$-(ET)$_2$Ag$_2$(CN)$_3$ with a spin-1/2 triangular lattice. The application of negative chemical pressure to $κ$-(ET)$_2$Cu$_2$(CN)$_3$, which is a well-known sister Mott insulator, allows for extensive tuning of antiferromagnetic exchange coupling, with $J/k_{\rm B} = 175 - 310$ K, under hydrostatic pressure. Based on $^{13}$C nuclear magnetic resonance measurements under pressure, we uncover universal scaling in the static and dynamic spin susceptibilities down to low temperatures $\sim 0.1k_{\r…
