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arXiv:1604.03951 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Free coherent spinons in quantum square ice

Stefanos Kourtis, Claudio Castelnovo

Published Sep 1, 2016• 16 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We investigate the quantum dynamics of monopolelike excitations in quantum square ice, as captured by the strongly anisotropic spin-1/2 XXZ model on the checkerboard lattice. We obtain exact results for excitation dynamics in both analytically solvable effective models and a fully interacting model of quantum square ice on finite clusters. We find that the dispersive lower bound of the dynamic response of freely propagating spinons is recovered in the dynamic structure factor of the interacting system, yielding a marked fingerprint of coherent spinon dispersion. Our results provide unbiased evidence for the formation of coherent quasiparticles propagating freely in the correlated ``vacuum'' of quantum square ice.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.94.104401

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We investigate the quantum dynamics of monopolelike excitations in quantum square ice, as captured by the strongly anisotropic spin-1/2 XXZ model on the checkerboard lattice. We obtain exact results for excitation dynamics in both analytically solvable effective models and a fully interacting model of quantum square ice on finite clusters. We find that the dispersive lower bound of the dynamic response of freely propagating spinons is recovered in the dynamic structure factor of the interacting system, yielding a marked fingerprint of coherent spinon dispersion. Our results provide unbiased evidence for the formation of coherent quasiparticles propagating freely in the correlated ``vacuum'' of quantum square ice.
We study the dynamics of spinons in quantum square ice, as captured by the strongly anisotropic spin-1/2 XXZ model on the checkerboard lattice. We analyze in detail the kinetics of quantum-mechanical spin-flip excitations called spinons, which is governed by the transverse term. We formulate effective free theories of spinon pair propagation, either deconfined or artificially confined to nearest-neighbor distance. We identify the fingerprint of coherent spinon propagation in the dynamic structure factor of the full interacting model, evaluated numerically for finite clusters. We thus provide unbiased evidence for the formation of free coherent quasiparticles in the correlated vacuum of quantum square ice.
Frustrated spin-ice systems support emergent gauge fields and fractionalized quasiparticles that act as magnetic monopoles. Although artificial platforms have enabled their direct visualization, access to their quantum-coherent dynamics has remained limited. Here we realize a programmable dipolar square spin-ice model using a superconducting-qubit quantum annealer, providing access to a previously unexplored quantum-coherent regime of artificial spin ice. By implementing a direct one-to-one mapping between lattice spins and physical qubits, together with engineered extended couplings, we realize effective dipolar interactions on frustrated lattices comprising more than 400 vertices. Tuning transverse-field fluctuations enables us to probe the real-time dynamics of Dirac-string defects and interacting monopole plasmas. We observe super-diffusive monopole transport, with scaling exponents intermediate between classical diffusion and ballistic motion, indicating dynamics beyond classical stochastic relaxation and consistent with coherent propagation within an emergent gauge manifold. These results establish programmable quantum spin ice as a scalable platform for investigating fractionalized excitations and emergent gauge dynamics in engineered quantum matter.
We study the quantum spin dynamics of a frustrated XXZ model on a pyrochlore lattice by using large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulation and stochastic analytic continuation. In the low-temperature quantum spin ice regime, we observe signatures of coherent photon and spinon excitations in the dynamic spin structure factor. As the temperature rises to the classical spin ice regime, the photon disappears from the dynamic spin structure factor, whereas the dynamics of the spinon remain coherent in a broad temperature window. Our results provide experimentally relevant, quantitative information for the ongoing pursuit of quantum spin ice materials.
We develop a theory of the dynamical response of a minimal model of quantum spin ice (QSI) by means of inelastic light scattering. In particular, we are interested in the Raman response of the fractionalized U(1) spin liquid realized in the XXZ QSI. We show that the low-energy Raman intensity is dominated by spinon and gauge fluctuations. We find that the Raman response in the QSI state of that model appears only in the T2g{T}_{2g}T2g​ polarization channel. We show that the Raman intensity profile displays a broad continuum from the spinons and coupled spinon and gauge fluctuations, and a low-energy peak arising entirely from gauge fluctuations. Both features originate from the exotic interaction between photon and the fractionalized excitations of QSI. Our theoretical results suggest that inelastic Raman scattering can in principle serve as a promising experimental probe of the nature of a U(1) spin liquid in QSI.
The antiferromagnetic Ising model on a checkerboard lattice has an ice-like ground state manifold with extensive degeneracy. and, to leading order in Jxy{J}_{xy}Jxy​, deconfined spinon excitations. We explore the role of cyclic exchange arising at order Jxy2∕Jz{J}_{xy}^{2}∕{J}_{z}Jxy2​∕Jz​ on the ice states and their associated spinon excitations. By mapping the original problem onto an equivalent quantum six-vertex model, we identify three different phases as a function of the chemical potential for flippable plaquettes---a phase with long range N\'eel order and confined spinon excitations, a nonmagnetic state of resonating square plaquettes, and a quasicollinear phase with gapped but deconfined spinon excitations. The relevance of the results to the square-lattice quantum dimer model is also discussed.
We study how sharp signatures of fractionalization emerge in nonlinear spectroscopy experiments on spin liquids with separated energy scales. Our model is that of dipolar-octupolar rare earth pyrochlore materials, prime candidates for realizing quantum spin ice. This family of three-dimensional quantum spin liquids exhibits fractionalization of spin degrees of freedom into spinons charged under an emergent U(1) gauge field. We show that the technique of two-dimensional coherent spectroscopy can identify clear signatures of fractionalized spinon dynamics in dipolar-octupolar quantum spin ices. However, at intermediate temperatures, spinon dynamics are heavily constrained in the presence of an incoherent spin background, leading to a broad two-dimensional coherent spectroscopy response. At lower temperatures, a sharp signal emerges as the system enters a coherent spin liquid state. This lower temperature signal can in turn distinguish between zero-flux and π-flux forms of quantum spin ice.