Spin–phonon interaction effects in a spin-1/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chain coupled to phonons are investigated in systems with variable crystal structures. By performing a unitary transformation to a Hamiltonian of the system, we derive effective Hamiltonians expanded in powers of spin–phonon and spin–spin couplings. Ground-state phase transitions between a spin-liquid phase and a spin-gapped phase are investigated by a level spectroscopy analysis of numerical diagonalization data of effective systems. Our results depend on whether the ground state of the Heisenberg chain is in the spin-liquid phase or the spin-gapped phase. In the system where the ground state is in the spin-liquid phase, the spin–phonon interaction causes the usual phase transition to the spin-gapped phase. On the other hand, in the system where the ground state is in the spin-gapped phase, the spin–phonon interaction causes the novel phase transition to the spin-liquid phase for some geometrical structures. The phase transition from the spin-gapped phase to the spin-liquid phase is observed by changing a parameter to control the change in a geometrical structure.
Using a new version of the density-matrix renormalization group we determine the phase diagram of a model of an antiferromagnetic Heisenberg spin chain where the spins interact with quantum phonons. A quantum phase transition from a gapless spin-fluid state to a gapped dimerized phase occurs at a nonzero value of the spin-phonon coupling. The transition is in the same universality class as that of a frustrated spin chain, to which the model maps in the diabatic limit. We argue that realistic modeling of known spin-Peierls materials should include the effects of quantum phonons.
We study Heisenberg spin-1/2 and spin-1 chains with alternating ferromagnetic (
J1F) and antiferromagnetic (
J1A) nearest-neighbor interactions and ferromagnetic next-nearest-neighbor interaction (
J2F). In this model frustration is induced by the non-zero
J2F and the effect of dimerization is realized by changing the strength of
J1A for a fixed value of
J1F. The model with site spin
s behaves like a Haldane spin chain with site spin 2
s in the limit of vanishing
J2F and large
J1F/J1A. We show that the exact ground state of the model can be found along a line in the parameter space. The phase diagram in the space of
J1A−J2F is determined using numerical techniques complemented by some analytical calculations. A number of quantities, including the ground state spin, energy gap, structure factor, entanglement entropy, and zero temperature magnetization, are studied to understand the complete phase diagram. An interesting and application-wise important feature of this model is that it exhibits a macroscopic magnetization jump in the presence of a magnetic field; we study this using an effective Hamiltonian.
We present the zero-temperature phase diagram of a Heisenberg antiferromagnet on a frustrated triangular lattice with nearest-neighbor
(J1) and next-nearest-neighbor
(J2) interactions, in a magnetic field. We show that the classical model has an accidental degeneracy for all
J2/J1 and all fields, but the degeneracy is lifted by quantum fluctuations. We show that at large spin
S, for
J2/J1<1/8, quantum fluctuations select the same sequence of three sublattice co-planar states in a field as for
J2=0, and for
1/8<J2/J1<1, they select the canted stripe state for all nonzero fields. The transition between the two states is first order in all fields, with the hysteresis width set by quantum fluctuations. We study the model with arbitrary
S, including
S=1/2, near the saturation field by exploring the fact that near saturation the density of bosons is small for all
S. We show that for
S>1, the transition remains first order, with a finite hysteresis width, but for
S=1/2 and, possibly,
S=1, there appears a new intermediate phase without a quasiclassical long-range order.
We analyze the phase diagram of the frustrated Heisenberg antiferromagnet, the ${J}_{1}{\ensuremath{-}J}_{2}$ model, in two dimensions. Two quantum phase transitions in the model are already known: the second-order transition from the N\'eel state to the spin liquid state at ${(J}_{2}{/J}_{1}{)}_{c2}\ensuremath{\approx}0.38,$ and the first-order transition from the spin liquid state to the collinear state at ${(J}_{2}{/J}_{1}{)}_{c4}\ensuremath{\approx}0.60.$ We have found evidence for two second-order phase transitions: the transition from the spin columnar dimerized state to the state with plaquette-type modulation at ${(J}_{2}{/J}_{1}{)}_{c3}=0.50\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.02,$ and the transition from the simple N\'eel state to the N\'eel state with spin columnar dimerization at ${(J}_{2}{/J}_{1}{)}_{c1}=0.34\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.04.$ We also present an independent calculation of ${(J}_{2}{/J}_{1}{)}_{c2}\ensuremath{\approx}0.38$ using another approach.
The phase diagram of the anisotropic quantum spin-1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet in the presence of competitive nearest
(J1)- and next-nearest $({J}_{2}=\ensuremath{\alpha}{J}_{1})$-neighbor interactions on a simple cubic lattice is studied within the framework of the differential operator technique. The Hamiltonian is solved by using an effective-field theory in a two-spin cluster. We propose a function for the free energy, which is similar to the Landau expansion, in order to find the ground state
(T=0) and the finite-
T phase diagram. At zero temperature, we find a first-order quantum phase transition in the point ${\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}(\ensuremath{\Delta})$ between the antiferromagnetic (AF) and superantiferromagnetic (SAF) phases. This is dependent on the anisotropy parameter $\ensuremath{\Delta}$ ($\ensuremath{\Delta}=0$ and 1 correspond to the isotropic Heisenberg and Ising models, respectively). The quantum critical values of ${\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}(\ensuremath{\Delta}\ensuremath{\ne}1)={\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}^{q}(\ensuremath{\Delta})$ are smaller than those of the classical model ${\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}(\ensuremath{\Delta}=1)={\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}^{c}=1/4$ (for example, for $\ensuremath{\Delta}=0$, we find ${\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{c}^{q}(0)=0.21$). The former monotonically increases with the anisotropy parameter $\ensuremath{\Delta}$. The phase diagram in $T\text{\ensuremath{-}}\ensuremath{\alpha}$ plane presents a second-order transition at ${T}_{2}(\ensuremath{\alpha})$ between the AF and paramagnetic (P) phases. The phase transition between the SAF and P phases is of first-order ${T}_{1}(\ensuremath{\alpha})$ for all values of $\ensuremath{\Delta}∊[0,1]$. The phase transition lines ${T}_{1}(\ensuremath{\alpha})$ and ${T}_{2}(\ensuremath{\alpha})$ merge in a critical end point (CEP) that is dependent on $\ensuremath{\Delta}$ [i.e., ${T}_{\text{CEP}}(\ensuremath{\Delta})$ and ${\ensuremath{\alpha}}_{\text{CEP}}(\ensuremath{\Delta})$ are the temperature and frustration parameters at the CEP]. The ordered phases (AF and SAF) are separated by first-order transitions and exhibit a nontrivial re-entrant behavior at low temperatures.