We studied the thermodynamics of the one-dimensional J 1 - J 2 spin-1/2 Heisenberg chain for ferromagnetic nearest-neighbor bonds J 1 < 0 and frustrating antiferromagnetic next- nearest-neighbor bonds J 2 > 0 using full diagonalization of finite rings and a second-order Green-function formalism. Thereby we focus on J 2 < | J 1 |/4 where the ground state is still ferromagnetic, but the frustration influences the thermodynamic properties. We found that their critical indices are not changed by J 2 . The analysis of the low-temperature behavior of the susceptibility χ leads to the conclusion that this behavior changes from χ ∝ T -2 at J 2 < | J 1 |/4 to χ ∝ T -3/2 at the quantum-critical point J 2 = | J 1 |/4. Another effect of the frustration is the appearance of an extra low- T maximum in the specific heat C v ( T ) for J 2 & | J 1 |/8, indicating its strong influence on the low-energy spectrum.
A one-dimensional spin-1∕2 model in which the alternation of the exchange interactions between neighboring spins is accompanied by the next-nearest-neighbor (NNN) spin exchange (zig-zag spin ladder with alternation) is studied. The thermodynamic characteristics of the model quantum spin chain are obtained in the mean-field-like approximation. Depending on the strength of the NNN interactions, the model manifests either the spin-gapped behavior of low-lying excitations at low magnetic fields, or ferrimagnetic ordering in the ground state with gapless low-lying excitations. The system undergoes second-order or first-order quantum phase transitions, governed by the external magnetic field, NNN coupling strength, and the degree of the alternation. Hence, NNN spin–spin interactions in a dimerized quantum spin chain can produce a spontaneous magnetization. On the other hand, for quantum spin chains with a spontaneous magnetization, caused by NNN spin–spin couplings, the alternation of nearest-neighbor (NN) exchange interactions can cause destruction of that magnetization and the onset of a spin gap for low-lying excitations. Alternating NN interactions produce a spin gap between two branches of low-energy excitations, and the NNN interactions yield asymmetry of the dispersion laws of those excitations, with possible minima corresponding to incommensurate structures in the spin chain.
The thermodynamics of coupled frustrated ferromagnetic chains is studied within a spin-rotation-invariant Green's-function approach. We consider an isotropic Heisenberg spin-half system with a ferromagnetic in-chain coupling
J1<0 between nearest neighbors and a frustrating antiferromagnetic next-nearest-neighbor in-chain coupling
J2>0. We focus on the moderate strength of frustration
J2<∣J1∣/4 such that the in-chain spin-spin correlations are predominantly ferromagnetic. We consider two interchain couplings (ICs) ${J}_{\ensuremath{\perp},y}$ and ${J}_{\ensuremath{\perp},z}$, corresponding to the two axes perpendicular to the chain, where ferromagnetic as well as antiferromagnetic ICs are taken into account. We discuss the influence of frustration on the ground-state properties for antiferromagnetic ICs, where the ground state is of a quantum nature. The major part of our study is devoted to the finite-temperature properties. We calculate the critical temperature
Tc as a function of the competing exchange couplings ${J}_{2},{J}_{\ensuremath{\perp},y},{J}_{\ensuremath{\perp},z}$. We find that for fixed ICs,
Tc decreases monotonically with increasing frustration
J2, where as ${J}_{2}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}|{J}_{1}|/4$ the
Tc(J2) curve drops down rapidly. To characterize the magnetic ordering below and above
Tc, we calculate the spin-spin correlation functions $\ensuremath{\langle}{\mathbf{S}}_{0}{\mathbf{S}}_{\mathbf{R}}\ensuremath{\rangle}$, the magnetic order parameter
M, the uniform static susceptibility ${\ensuremath{\chi}}_{0}$, as well as the correlation length $\ensuremath{\xi}$. Moreover, we discuss the specific heat
CV and the temperature dependence of the excitation spectrum ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{\mathbf{q}}$. As ${J}_{2}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}|{J}_{1}|/4$, some unusual frustration-induced features were found, such as an increase of the in-chain spin stiffness (in the case of ferromagnetic ICs) or of the in-chain spin-wave velocity (in the case of antiferromagnetic ICs) with growing temperature.
Low-lying excited states as well as the ground state of the spin-1 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chain with a spin-1/2 impurity are studied by means of a method of numerical diagonalization. The isotropic nearest-neighbor exchange coupling plus the uniaxial single-ion-type anisotropy energy is assumed for the host-system Hamiltonian. The energy differences between the ground state and the low-lying excited states, which appear in the Haldane gap, are estimated in the thermodynamic limit. The results are used to analyze the electron-spin-resonance experimental data on Ni(C
2H
8N
2)
2NO
2(ClO
4), abbreviated NENP, containing a small amount of spin-1/2 Cu
2+ impurities. It is found that in this system, the impurity-host
(Cu
2+-Ni
2+) coupling is ferromagnetic and its magnitude is about 5
\% of the magnitude of the host-host
(Ni
2+-Ni
2+) coupling.
We consider analytically and numerically an anisotropic $\text{spin}\ensuremath{-}\frac{1}{2}$ delta chain (sawtooth chain) with nearest-neighbor ferromagnetic and next-nearest-neighbor antiferromagnetic interactions. For certain values of the interactions a lowest one-particle band becomes flat and there is a class of localized-magnon eigenstates which form a ground state with a macroscopic degeneracy. In this case the model depends on a single parameter which can be chosen as the anisotropy of the exchange interactions. When this parameter changes from zero to infinity the model interpolates between the one-dimensional isotropic ferromagnet and the frustrated Ising model on the delta chain. It is shown that the low-temperature thermodynamic properties in these limiting cases are governed by the specific structure of the excitation spectrum. In particular, the specific heat has one or infinite number of low-temperature maxima for the small or the large anisotropy parameter, correspondingly. Qualitative features of such behavior survive when the interaction parameters deviate from the relations providing the local magnon ground state.