The S = 1/2 Heisenberg chains with bond alternation and randomness on the strong bonds are studied by the density matrix renormalization group method. It is assumed that the oddth bond is antiferromagnetic with strength J and even-th bond can take the values JA and JF (JA > J > 0 > JF) randomly. The ground state of this model interpolates between the Haldane and dimer phases via a randomness dominated intermediate phase. Based on the scaling of the low energy spectrum and mean field treatment of the interchain coupling, it is found that the magnetic long range order is induced by randomness in the intermediate regime. In the magnetization curves, there appears a plateau at the fractional value of thesaturated magnetization. The fine structures of the magnetization curves and low energy spectrum are understood based on the cluster picture. The relation with the recent experiment for (CH3)2CHNH3Cu(ClxBr1−x)3 is discussed.
The S = 1/2 Heisenberg chains with bond alternation and randomness on the strong bonds are studied by the density matrix renormalization group method. It is assumed that the odd-th bond is antiferromagnetic with strength J and the even-th bond can take the values JA and JF (JA > J > 0 > JF) randomly. The ground state of this model interpolates between the Haldane and dimer phases via a randomness dominated intermediate phase. On the basis of the scaling of the low energy spectrum and mean field treatment of the interchain coupling, we find that the magnetic long range order is induced by randomness in the intermediate regime. In the magnetization curves, there appears a plateau at the fractional value of the saturated magnetization. The fine structures of the magnetization curves and low energy spectrum are understood using the cluster picture. The relation to the recent experiment for (CH3)2CHNH3Cu(ClxBr1-x)3 is discussed.
We use a tensor network renormalization group method to study random
S=2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chains with alternating bond strength distributions. In the absence of randomness, an imposed dimerization with bond alternation induces two quantum critical points between the
S=2 Haldane phase, a partially dimerized phase, and a fully dimerized phase, depending on the strength of dimerization. These three phases, called ($\ensuremath{\sigma},4\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\sigma}$) = (2,2), (3,1), and (4,0) phases, are valence-bond solid (VBS) states characterized by $\ensuremath{\sigma}$ valence bonds (effective spin-1/2 singlet pairs) forming across even links and $4\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\sigma}$ valence bonds on odd links. Here we study the effects of bond randomness on the ground states of the dimerized spin chain, calculating disorder-averaged twist order parameters and spin correlations. We classify the types of random VBS phases depending on the strength of bond randomness
R and dimerization
D using the twist order parameter, which has a negative/positive sign for a VBS phase with odd/even $\ensuremath{\sigma}$. Our results demonstrate the existence of a multicritical point in the intermediate disorder regime with finite dimerization, where (2,2), (3,1), and (4,0) phases meet. This multicritical point is at the junction of three phase boundaries in the $R\text{\ensuremath{-}}D$ plane: the (2,2)-(3,1) and (3,1)-(4,0) boundaries that extend to zero randomness, and the (2,2)-(4,0) phase boundary that connects another multicritical point in the undimerized limit. The undimerized multicritical point separates a gapless Haldane phase and an infinite-randomness critical line with the diverging dynamic critical exponent in the large-
R limit at
D=0. Furthermore, we identify the (3,1)-(4,0) phase boundary as an infinite-randomness critical line even at small
R and find the signature of infinite randomness at the (2,2)-(3,1) phase boundary only in the vicinity of the multicritical point.
The S=1/2 ferromagnetic (F) - antiferromagnetic (AF) random alternating Heisenberg quantum spin chain is investigated by the quantum Monte Carlo method. The randomness is only present on the strong bonds taking values of ±2J randomly, and the weak bonds are uniformly antiferromagnetic with J. The model corresponds to the quasi one-dimensional compound, (CH3)2CHNH3Cu(Clx, Br1-x)3, whose ground state interpolates the Haldane state of the F-AF alternating spin chain at x=1 and the singlet-dimer state of the AF-AF alternating spin chain at x=0. The nonequilibrium relaxation function of the staggered magnetic susceptibility exhibits algebraic divergence in the intermediate region of 0.44 ≪ x ≪ 0.87, which explains the experimental observation of the magnetic phase transition. The results suggest that the antiferromagnetic order becomes critical by the randomness of the bond distributions even in the presence of the rich ferromagnetic bonds.
The effect of bond randomness on the spin-gapped ground state of the spin-1 bond-alternating antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chain is discussed. By using the loop cluster quantum Monte Carlo method, we investigate the stability of topological order in terms of the recently proposed twist order parameter [M. Nakamura and S. Todo: Phys. Rev. Lett. 89 (2002) 077204]. It is observed that the dimer phases as well as the Haldane phase of the spin-1 Heisenberg chain are robust against a weak randomness, though the valence-bond-solid-like topological order in the latter phase is destroyed by introducing a disorder stronger than the critical value.
A possibility of the uniform antiferromagnetic order is pointed out in an S=1/2 ferromagnetic (F) - antiferromagnetic (AF) random alternating Heisenberg quantum spin chain compound: (CH_3)_2 CHNH_3 Cu(Cl_x Br_{1-x})_3. The system possesses the bond alternation of strong random bonds that take +/- 2J and weak uniform AF bonds of -J. In the pure concentration limits, the model reduces to the AF-AF alternation chain at x=0 and to the F-AF alternation chain at x=1. The nonequilibrium relaxation of large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulations exhibits critical behaviors of the uniform AF order in the intermediate concentration region, which explains the experimental observation of the magnetic phase transition. The present results suggest that the uniform AF order may survive even in the presence of the randomly located ferromagnetic bonds.