We solve the
S=1/2 infinite-range random Heisenberg Hamiltonian in the paramagnetic phase using quantum Monte Carlo and analytical techniques. We find that the spin-glass susceptibility diverges at a finite temperature
Tg which demonstrates the existence of a low-temperature ordered phase. Quantum fluctuations reduce the critical temperature and the effective Curie constant with respect to their classical values. They also give rise to a redistribution of spectral weight in the dynamic structure factor in the paramagnetic phase. As the temperature decreases the spectrum of magnetic excitations gradually splits into quasi-elastic and inelastic contributions whose weights scale as
S2 and
S at low temperature.
We study with exact diagonalization techniques the Heisenberg model for a system of SU(2) spins with
S=1/2 and random infinite-range exchange interactions. We calculate the critical temperature
Tg for the spin-glass to paramagnetic transition. We obtain ${T}_{g}\ensuremath{\approx}0.13,$ in good agreement with previous quantum Monte Carlo and analytical estimates. We provide a detailed picture for the different kind of excitations which intervene in the dynamical response ${\ensuremath{\chi}}^{\ensuremath{''}}(\ensuremath{\omega},T)$ at
T=0 and analyze their evolution as T increases. We also calculate the specific heat
Cv(T). We find that it displays a smooth maximum at ${T}_{M}\ensuremath{\approx}0.25,$ in good qualitative agreement with experiments. We argue that the fact that
TM>Tg is due to a quantum disorder effect.
A central question in frustrated quantum magnets is how quantum fluctuations destabilize spin-glass order and promote quantum spin-liquid behavior. We study the equilibrium dynamics of an infinite-range quantum Heisenberg model with random couplings, in which local magnetic moments arise from N_{f} flavors of spinful fermions. We employ an expansion in N_{f}, which controls the strength of quantum fluctuations, and self-consistently include 1/N_{f} corrections to the Luttinger-Ward functional. In the large-N_{f} limit, where quantum fluctuations are weak, the high- and low-temperature phases are respectively paramagnetic and spin glass ordered, with a transition temperature independent of N_{f}. For small numbers of fermionic flavors, however, quantum fluctuations substantially suppress the ordering temperature. We show that this behavior reflects the proximity of the system to a Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) regime, realizing quantum spin-liquid dynamics over a broad range of finite frequencies, where both fermionic and spin spectral densities display critical behavior over a broad range of finite frequencies, with the latter exhibiting the scale-invariant form χ^{''}(ω)∼sgn(ω). At the lowest energies and temperatures, spin glass dynamics ultimately take over, producing a universal sub-Ohmic dynamical spin susceptibility χ^{''}(ω)∼sgn(ω)sqrt[|ω|]. Our results highlight a direct connection between the suppression of spin-glass order and the emergence of SYK criticality in a frustrated quantum magnet.
We study dynamical properties at finite temperature
(T) of Heisenberg spin chains with random antiferromagnetic exchange couplings, which realize the random singlet phase in the low-energy limit, using three complementary numerical methods: exact diagonalization, matrix-product-state algorithms, and stochastic analytic continuation of quantum Monte Carlo results in imaginary time. Specifically, we investigate the dynamic spin structure factor $S(q,\ensuremath{\omega})$ and its $\ensuremath{\omega}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}0$ limit, which are closely related to inelastic neutron scattering and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiments (through the spin-lattice relaxation rate
1/T1). Our study reveals a continuous narrow band of low-energy excitations in $S(q,\ensuremath{\omega})$, extending throughout the
q space, instead of being restricted to $q\ensuremath{\approx}0$ and $q\ensuremath{\approx}\ensuremath{\pi}$ as found in the uniform system. Close to $q=\ensuremath{\pi}$, the scaling properties of these excitations are well captured by the random-singlet theory, but disagreements also exist with some aspects of the predicted
q dependence further away from $q=\ensuremath{\pi}$. Furthermore we also find spin diffusion effects close to
q=0 that are not contained within the random-singlet theory but give non-negligible contributions to the mean
1/T1. To compare with NMR experiments, we consider the distribution of the local relaxation rates
1/T1. We show that the local
1/T1 values are broadly distributed, approximately according to a stretched exponential. The mean
1/T1 first decreases with
T, but below a crossover temperature it starts to increase and likely diverges in the limit of a small nuclear resonance frequency ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{0}$. Although a similar divergent behavior has been predicted and experimentally observed for the static uniform susceptibility, this divergent behavior of the mean
1/T1 has never been experimentally observed. Indeed, we show that the divergence of the mean
1/T1 is due to rare events in the disordered chains and is concealed in experiments, where the typical
1/T1 value is accessed.
We examine the quantum phase transition at zero temperature between paramagnetic and spin-glass-ordered phases as the strength of a uniform transverse field, \ensuremath{\Gamma}, is varied. At the critical point, ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\mathit{c}}$, the spin autocorrelation function decays with time, t, as ${\mathit{t}}^{\mathrm{\ensuremath{-}}2}$. As the transition is approached from the paramagnetic phase the nonlinear susceptibility diverges as {\ensuremath{\Vert}ln(\ensuremath{\Gamma}-${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\mathit{c}}$)\ensuremath{\Vert}/(\ensuremath{\Gamma}-${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\mathit{c}}$)${\mathrm{}}}^{1/2}$.
The interplay between quantum fluctuations and disorder is investigated in a quantum spin-glass model, in the presence of a uniform transverse field $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$, as well as of a longitudinal random field
hi, which follows a Gaussian distribution characterized by a width proportional to $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$. The interactions are infinite-ranged, and the model is studied through the replica formalism, within a one-step replica-symmetry-breaking procedure; in addition, the dependence of the Almeida-Thouless eigenvalue ${\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{\mathrm{AT}}$ (replicon) on the applied fields is analyzed. This study is motivated by experimental investigations on the ${\mathrm{LiHo}}_{x}{\mathrm{Y}}_{1\ensuremath{-}x}{\mathrm{F}}_{4}$ compound, where the application of a transverse magnetic field yields rather intriguing effects, particularly related to the behavior of the nonlinear magnetic susceptibility ${\ensuremath{\chi}}_{3}$, which have led to a considerable experimental and theoretical debate. We have analyzed two physically distinct situations, namely, $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$ and $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$ considered as independent, as well as these two quantities related, as proposed recently by some authors. In both cases, a spin-glass phase transition is found at a temperature
Tf, with such phase being characterized by a nontrivial ergodicity breaking; moreover,
Tf decreases by increasing $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$ towards a quantum critical point at zero temperature. The situation where $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$ and $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$ are related $[\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\equiv}\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}(\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}})]$ appears to reproduce better the experimental observations on the ${\mathrm{LiHo}}_{x}{\mathrm{Y}}_{1\ensuremath{-}x}{\mathrm{F}}_{4}$ compound, with the theoretical results coinciding qualitatively with measurements of the nonlinear susceptibility ${\ensuremath{\chi}}_{3}$. In this later case, by increasing $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$ gradually, ${\ensuremath{\chi}}_{3}$ becomes progressively rounded, presenting a maximum at a temperature
T∗ (T∗>Tf), with both the amplitude of the maximum and the value of
T∗ decreasing gradually. Moreover, we also show that the random field is the main responsible for the smearing of the nonlinear susceptibility, acting significantly inside the paramagnetic phase, leading to two regimes delimited by the temperature
T∗, one for
Tf<T<T∗, and another one for
T>T∗. It is argued that the conventional paramagnetic state corresponds to
T>T∗, whereas the temperature region
Tf<T<T∗ may be characterized by a rather unusual dynamics, possibly including Griffiths singularities.