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arXiv:cond-mat/0309425 · Journal of Physics Condensed Matter

Magnetization plateaus in frustrated antiferromagnetic quantum spin models

A. Honecker, J. Schulenburg, Johannes Richter

Published Mar 4, 2004• 185 citations
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Abstract

Plateaus can be observed in the zero-temperature magnetization curve of quantum spin systems at rational values of the magnetization. In one dimension, the appearance of a plateau is controlled by a quantization condition for the magnetization which involves the length of the local spin and the volume of a translational unit cell of the ground state. We discuss examples of geometrically frustrated quantum spin systems with large (in general unbounded) periodicities of spontaneous breaking of translational symmetry in the ground state. In two dimensions, we discuss the square, triangular and Kagomé lattices using exact diagonalization (ED) for up to N = 40 sites. For the spin-1/2 XXZ model on the triangular lattice we study the nature and stability region of a plateau at one third of the saturation magnetization. The Kagomé lattice gives rise to particularly rich behaviour with several plateaus in the magnetization curve and a jump due to local magnon excitations just below saturation.

DOI
10.1088/0953-8984/16/11/025

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Plateaus can be observed in the zero-temperature magnetization curve of quantum spin systems at rational values of the magnetization. In one dimension, the appearance of a plateau is controlled by a quantization condition for the magnetization which involves the length of the local spin and the volume of a translational unit cell of the ground state. We discuss examples of geometrically frustrated quantum spin systems with large (in general unbounded) periodicities of spontaneous breaking of translational symmetry in the ground state. In two dimensions, we discuss the square, triangular and Kagomé lattices using exact diagonalization (ED) for up to N = 40 sites. For the spin-1/2 XXZ model on the triangular lattice we study the nature and stability region of a plateau at one third of the saturation magnetization. The Kagomé lattice gives rise to particularly rich behaviour with several plateaus in the magnetization curve and a jump due to local magnon excitations just below saturation.
The spin-12\frac{1}{2}21​ Heisenberg model on a kagome lattice is a typical frustrated quantum spin system. The basic structure of a kagome lattice is also present in the kagome-strip lattice in one dimension, where a similar type of frustration is expected. We thus study the magnetization plateaus of the spin-12\frac{1}{2}21​ Heisenberg model on a kagome-strip chain with three-independent antiferromagnetic exchange interactions using the density-matrix renormalization-group method. In a certain range of exchange parameters, we find twelve kinds of magnetization plateaus, nine of which have magnetic structures breaking translational and/or reflection symmetry spontaneously. The structures are classified by an array of five-site unit cells with specific bond-spin correlations. In a case with a nontrivial plateau, namely a 3/10 plateau, we find long-period magnetic structure with a period of four unit cells.
Magnetization plateaus in quantum spin systems emerges in two-dimensional frustrated systems such as kagome lattice. The spin-1/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model on square-kagome lattice is also appropriate for the study of magnetization plateau. Motivated by recent experimental finding of such a square-kagome lattice with nonequivalent three bonds, we investigate the phase diagrams and magnetization plateaus of the lattice by the exact diagonalization method. In addition to previously reported the 1/3 and 2/3 plateaus in the model with two equivalent bonds, we find a new 2/3 plateau whose magnetic structure is characterized by spontaneously broken four-fold rotational symmetry. The plateau appears only in the case of three nonequivalent bonds. We propose the possibility of finding plateaus including the new one.
We analyze the magnetization curve of the spin-1/2 kagome Heisenberg model in a magnetic field. Using state-of-the-art variational wave functions based on neural networks, we confirm the presence of robust magnetization plateaus at m=1/3m=1/3m=1/3, 5/95/95/9 and 7/97/97/9 of the saturation value, stabilized by a spontaneous symmetry breaking of lattice translations with a 3×3\sqrt{3}\times \sqrt{3}3​×3​ unit cell. Regarding the more challenging m=1/9m=1/9m=1/9 plateau, we find two competing valence bond crystals depending on the system size, both breaking translation as well as point group symmetries and with a larger 3×33\times 33×3 unit cell. Such quantum states with local modulations of the magnetization average values could be observed experimentally in the near future.
We clarify the existence of several magnetization plateaus for the kagome S=12S=\frac{1}{2}S=21​ antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model in a magnetic field. Using approximate or exact localized magnon eigenstates, we are able to describe in a similar manner the plateau states that occur for magnetization per site m=13m=\frac{1}{3}m=31​, 59\frac{5}{9}95​, and 79\frac{7}{9}97​ of the saturation value. These results are confirmed using large-scale exact diagonalization on lattices up to 63 sites.
Plateaux in the magnetization curves of the square-, triangular- and hexagonal-lattice spin-1/2 XXZ antiferromagnet are investigated. One finds a zero-magnetization plateau (corresponding to a spin gap) on the square and hexagonal lattice with Ising-like anisotropies, and a plateau with one-third of the saturation magnetization on the triangular lattice which survives a small amount of easy-plane anisotropy. Here we start with transfer-matrix computations for the Ising limit and continue with series in the XXZ anisotropy for plateau boundaries using the ground states of the Ising limit. The main focus is then a numerical computation of the magnetization curves with anisotropies in the vicinity of the isotropic situation. Finally, we discuss the universality class associated with the asymptotic behaviour of the magnetization curve close to saturation, as observed numerically in two and higher dimensions.
We investigate the spin-1 kagome-lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnet using large-scale Lanczos diagonalization and the finite-temperature Lanczos method. The zero-temperature magnetization process exhibits plateaus at m = 0 , 1 / 3 , 7 / 9 , and 8 / 9 , where m is the normalized magnetization. The m = 0 plateau is identified as a trimer valence-bond-crystal state, while the high-field plateaus at m = 7 / 9 and 8 / 9 are identified as magnon crystals. In particular, the m = 8 / 9 plateau corresponds to the exact localized-magnon crystal state. A smoothed zero-temperature magnetization curve constructed using the Gaussian-kernel smoothing method indicates magnetization jumps at the lower-field edge of the m = 1 / 3 plateau and at the upper-field edges of the m = 7 / 9 and 8 / 9 plateaus. At finite temperatures, the specific heat exhibits a double-peak structure with peaks around T / J ≃ 0.1 and T / J ≃ 1.1 , and the low-temperature peak may be related to trimer valence-bond-crystal ordering. The finite-temperature magnetization curves show that the m = 1 / 3 plateau remains visible at low temperatures, whereas the high-field plateaus are rapidly smeared out by thermal effects. These results provide benchmark data for thermodynamic and high-field magnetization measurements in candidate spin-1 kagome-lattice materials.