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arXiv:2409.20103 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Low-energy spin excitations in field-induced phases of the spin-ladder antiferromagnet BiCu 2 PO 6

Patrick Pilch, Kirill Amelin, Gary Schmiedinghoff, Anneke Reinold, Changqing Zhu, Kirill Yu. Povarov, Sergei A. Zvyagin, Hans Engelkamp, Yin-Ping Lan, Guo‐Jiun Shu, F. C. Chou, U. Nagel, T. Rõõm, Götz Silvester Uhrig, Benedikt Fauseweh, Zhe Wang

Published Jan 27, 2025• 4 citations
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Abstract

We report on terahertz spectroscopic measurements of quantum spin dynamics on single crystals of a spin-1/2 frustrated spin-ladder antiferromagnet ${\mathrm{BiCu}}_{2}{\mathrm{PO}}_{6}$ as a function of temperature, polarization, and applied external magnetic fields. Spin triplon excitations are observed at zero field and split in applied magnetic fields. For magnetic fields applied along the crystallographic $a$ axis, a quantum phase transition at ${B}_{c1}=21.4$ T is featured by a low-energy excitation mode emerging above ${B}_{c1}$, which indicates a gap reopening. For fields along the $b$ axis and the $c$ axis, different field dependencies are observed for the spin triplon excitations, whereas no low-lying modes could be resolved at field-induced phase transitions. We perform a theoretical analysis of the magnetic field dependence of the spin triplon modes by using continuous unitary transformations to determine an effective low-energy Hamiltonian. Through an exhaustive parameter search we find numerically optimized parameters to very well describe the experimentally observed modes, which corroborate the importance of significant magnetic anisotropy in the system.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.111.024423

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We report on terahertz spectroscopic measurements of quantum spin dynamics on single crystals of a spin-1/2 frustrated spin-ladder antiferromagnet BiCu2PO6{\mathrm{BiCu}}_{2}{\mathrm{PO}}_{6}BiCu2​PO6​ as a function of temperature, polarization, and applied external magnetic fields. Spin triplon excitations are observed at zero field and split in applied magnetic fields. For magnetic fields applied along the crystallographic aaa axis, a quantum phase transition at Bc1=21.4{B}_{c1}=21.4Bc1​=21.4 T is featured by a low-energy excitation mode emerging above Bc1{B}_{c1}Bc1​, which indicates a gap reopening. For fields along the bbb axis and the ccc axis, different field dependencies are observed for the spin triplon excitations, whereas no low-lying modes could be resolved at field-induced phase transitions. We perform a theoretical analysis of the magnetic field dependence of the spin triplon modes by using continuous unitary transformations to determine an effective low-energy Hamiltonian. Through an exhaustive parameter search we find numerically optimized parameters to very well describe the experimentally observed modes, which corroborate the importance of significant magnetic anisotropy in the system.
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We provide a theory of triplon dynamics in the valence bond solid ground state of the coupled spin ladders modeled for BiCu2PO6{\mathrm{BiCu}}_{2}{\mathrm{PO}}_{6}BiCu2​PO6​. Utilizing the recent high-quality neutron scattering data [K. W. Plumb et al., Nat. Phys. 12, 224 (2016)] as guides and a theory of interacting triplons via the bond operator formulation, we determine a minimal spin Hamiltonian for this system. It is shown that the splitting of the low-energy triplon modes and the peculiar magnetic field dependence of the triplon dispersions can be explained by including substantial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya and symmetric anisotropic spin interactions. Taking into account the interactions between triplons and the decay of the triplons to the two-triplon continuum via anisotropic spin interactions, we provide a theoretical picture that can be used to understand the main features of the recent neutron scattering experimental data.
We theoretically study the magnetic excitations in a frustrated two-leg spin-ladder system, in which antiferromagnetic exchange interactions act on the nearest-neighbor and next-nearest-neighbor bonds in the leg direction, and on the nearest-neighbor bonds in the rung direction. A dynamical spin correlation function at zero temperature is calculated using the dynamical density-matrix renormalization-group method for possible magnetic phases, i.e., columnar-dimer and rung-singlet phases. The columnar-dimer phase is characterized by multispinon excitations with a spin gap, whereas the rung-singlet phase is dominated by the triplet excitation in the rung direction. One major difference found between these two phases appears in the spectral weight of magnetic excitations, in particular, the bonding and antibonding modes in the rung direction. Therefore, we can distinguish one phase from the other by the difference in the spectral weight. Furthermore, we examine the effect of frustration on both modes in the rung-singlet phase with a perturbation theory from the strong coupling limit. The antibonding mode is shown to be stable against frustration, and a wave number with minimum excitation energy is shifted from being commensurate to being incommensurate. In contrast, the bonding mode is merged into the continuum excitation of multiple triplet excitations by increasing frustration. By comparing our results with inelastic neutron scattering experiments for BiCu2{}_{2}2​PO6{}_{6}6​, the magnitude of the magnetic exchange interactions and the ground state will be determined.
Antiferromagnetic spin-1/2 ladders have been studied in theoretical and experimental physics for several years. The spin ladder is a good model to bridge between theory and experiment, because it is realized in the copper oxide family Sr14-x(La,Ca)xCu24O41. These copper oxides consist of alternating layers of edge-sharing chains and ladders. The insulating mother compound Sr14Cu24O41 is hole doped in the chains as well as slightly in the ladders. The hole content in the Sr14Cu24O41 ladders is reduced, if La3+ is substituted for Sr2+ resulting in a pure antiferromagnetic spin ladder given by La4Sr10Cu24O41. In this thesis such spin ladders are studied by an amalgamated approach of theoretical work and experiments. For the La4Sr10Cu24O41 ladder the temperature development is investigated using scattering techniques as well as computer modelling. At zero temperature the spin ladder has already been well described by effective models computed via perturbative continuous unitary transformations (PCUTs). These PCUT results are now combined with a mean field approach allowing for incorporation of temperature induced conditional excitations via vertex corrections. The vertex correction results in a decreasing one-triplon spectral weight upon increasing temperature. This effect is studied by inelastic neutron scattering (INS) on La4Sr10Cu24O41 crystals by measuring the scattering amplitude at various temperatures. Convincing agreement is found within the experimental and theoretical error bars. Additionally the coupling constants found in Ref. [1] could be confirmed. The importance of an inter-ladder coupling Jinter between isolated ladders in the plane is investigated by combination of the PCUT with a mean field approach. This calculation is undertaken for the square and the trellis lattice. The difference to the existing calculations [2], [3] and [4] is the partial inclusion of the hardcore interaction for neighbouring ladders. At zero temperature we reveal the effect of quantum fluctuations on the spin gap. In the case of the square lattice we find the closure of the spin gap at a critical inter-ladder coupling enlarged by 3 - 4%. In the case of the trellis lattice, the spin gap decreases also as a function of inter-ladder coupling. In this case we find an enlarged critical inter-ladder coupling up to 21%. In additon, the theoretically predicted shift of the spectral weight by Uhrig and Schmidt could experimentally be confirmed. Substituting Ca2+ for Sr2+ results in hole doped ladders, such as Sr2.5Ca11.5Cu24O41 and Sr8Ca6Cu24O41, where the hole doping depends on the substituted Ca2+ content. The magnetic spectra of these two doped ladders are measured by INS and compared with the undoped ladder La4Sr10Cu24O41. The comparison reveals new features tracing back to the presence of holes. At low temperature in both compounds scattering below the gap of the undoped ladder is found resulting in a subgap1 state at about 8meV. The subgap broadens at high temperature so much that the closing of the subgap results. Additionally for both dopings and at low and high temperature a hole-pair captured by triplons is found with a fixed energy gap at 23meV. The new features are qualitatively explained in terms of resonant valence bond theory (RVB) as well as stripe ordering theory.
We have used a combination of neutron resonant spin-echo and triple-axis spectroscopies to determine the energy, fine structure, and linewidth of the magnon resonance in the model spin-1/2 ladder antiferromagnet IPA-CuCl(3) at temperatures T≪Δ(0)/k(B), where Δ(0) is the spin gap at T=0. In this low-temperature regime we find that the results deviate substantially from the predictions of the nonlinear sigma model proposed as a description of magnon excitations in one-dimensional quantum magnets and attribute these deviations to real-space and spin-space anisotropies in the spin Hamiltonian as well as scattering of magnon excitations from a dilute density of impurities. These effects are generic to experimental realizations of one-dimensional quantum magnets.
We investigate weakly coupled spin-1/21/21/2 ladders in a magnetic field. The work is motivated by recent experiments on the compound (CH12N)CuBr4{(}_{\mathrm{C}}{\mathrm{H}}_{12}{\mathrm{N}}_{)}{\mathrm{CuBr}}_{4}(C​H12​N)​CuBr4​ (BPCB). We use a combination of numerical and analytical methods, in particular, the density-matrix renormalization group (DMRG) technique, to explore the phase diagram and the excitation spectra of such a system. We give detailed results on the temperature dependence of the magnetization and the specific heat, and the magnetic-field dependence of the nuclear-magnetic-resonance relaxation rate of single ladders. For coupled ladders, treating the weak interladder coupling within a mean-field or quantum Monte Carlo approach, we compute the transition temperature of triplet condensation and its corresponding antiferromagnetic order parameter. Existing experimental measurements are discussed and compared to our theoretical results. Furthermore, we compute, using time-dependent DMRG, the dynamical correlations of a single spin ladder. Our results allow to describe directly the inelastic neutron scattering cross section up to high energies. We focus on the evolution of the spectra with the magnetic field and compare their behavior for different couplings. The characteristic features of the spectra are interpreted using different analytical approaches such as the mapping onto a spin chain, a Luttinger liquid or onto a ttt-JJJ model. For values of parameters for which such measurements exist, we compare our results to inelastic neutron scattering experiments on the compound BPCB and find excellent agreement. We make additional predictions for the high-energy part of the spectrum that are potentially testable in future experiments.