Weak ferromagnetic exchange and anomalous specific heat in ZnCu3(OH)6Cl2

Striped spin liquid crystal ground state instability of kagome antiferromagnets

The Dirac spin liquid ground state of the spin 1/2 Heisenberg kagome antiferromagnet has potential instabilities. This has been suggested as the reason why it does not emerge as the ground state in large-scale numerical calculations. However, previous attempts to observe these instabilities have failed. We report on the discovery of a projected BCS state with lower energy than the projected Dirac spin liquid state which provides new insight into the stability of the ground state of the kagome antiferromagnet. The new state has three remarkable features. First, it breaks spatial symmetry in an unusual way that may leave spinons deconfined along one direction. Second, it breaks the U(1) gauge symmetry down to Z(2). Third, it has the spatial symmetry of a previously proposed "monopole" suggesting that it is an instability of the Dirac spin liquid. The state described herein also shares a remarkable similarity to the distortion of the kagome lattice observed at low Zn concentrations in Zn-paratacamite and in recently grown single crystals of volborthite suggesting it may already be realized in these materials.

Unveiling the physics of the doped phase of the t - J model on the kagome lattice

We investigate the ground state properties of the kagome lattice t - J model at low doping by variational Monte Carlo calculations. The resulting state possesses an interesting balance of spin exchange and kinetic exchange through the building blocks of stars which are linked by triangles and their internal hexagons. While the spin exchange is taking place mainly on the stars, hopping is favored on the hexagons. There is a density modulation, resulting in the holes having an effective static contribution. From this observation, how holes lead to dimerization in this model and why a particular valence bond crystal pattern is formed can be understood. Furthermore, we argue the optimal doping for this state. We discuss our result in connection with static impurities, and show the likely relevance to the diluted kagome lattice Heisenberg model, describing actual compounds.

Raman spectroscopic study of the frustrated spin 1/2 antiferromagnet clinoatacamite

Raman spectroscopy is a valuable and complementary tool for studying geometrically frustrated magnetic systems due to the intrinsic spin-phonon coupling. Here, we report on a Raman spectroscopic study of the geometrically frustrated spin 1/2 antiferromagnet microcrystalline clinoatacamite Cu2(OH)3Cl, focusing on the anomalous transition into the intermediate phase at T(c1) = 18.1 K. By measuring the temperature-dependent (295-4 K) full spectral profiles and main representative modes in spectral regions from 4000 to 95 cm(-1), we observed probable signatures of successive magnetic transitions near T(c1) = 18 K and T(c2) = 6.4 K in the Raman band frequencies and peak widths of the representative modes. Further, we observed a pronounced Raman spectroscopy background featuring a broad continuum at all temperatures. A quantitative analysis reveals that spin fluctuations may exist on a picosecond time scale in the intermediate phase. The short time scale falls out of the μSR time window; therefore, in the intermediate phase, the μSR study as reported in (2005 Phys. Rev. Lett. 95 057201) apparently only probed the local field of the ordered spins but overlooked the quickly fluctuating ones. This is likely to give a reasonable explanation of the fact that only a small entropy release occurs at T(c1) = 18 K although a long-range order is formed.

Low-energy spin dynamics of the s = 1/2 kagome system herbertsmithite

The low-energy (ε = ħω < 1 meV), low-temperature (T = 0.05 K) spin dynamics of the s = 1/2 kagome candidate herbertsmithite are probed in the presence of magnetic fields up to 2.5 T. The zero-field spectra reveal a very weak continuum of scattering at T = 10 K and a broad inelastic peak centred at ε(max) = 0.2 meV at lower temperatures, T < 1 K. The broad peak is found to be strongly damped, with a liquid-like structure factor implying correlations at length scales up to r = 6 Å. The field dependence of the peak appears to follow the Zeeman splitting of s = 1/2 excitations, consistent with the weakly split 'doublets' observed in low-temperature specific heat. A possible explanation of these observations is a short-range correlated state involving defect spins between the kagome planes and moments in the kagome layers.

How to measure a spinon fermi surface

We propose an experiment to identify the potential existence of a spinon Fermi surface by looking for oscillatory coupling between two ferromagnets via a spin liquid spacer. Three candidate spin liquids are investigated, and it is found out that in all cases long period oscillations should be present, the period of which would identify the Fermi wave vector of the spinon surface.

Gapless spin liquids on the three-dimensional hyperkagome lattice of Na4Ir3O8

Recent experiments indicate that Na4Ir3O8, a material in which s=1/2 Ir local moments live on a three-dimensional "hyperkagome" lattice of corner-sharing triangles, may have a quantum spin liquid ground state with gapless spin excitations. Using a combination of exact diagonalization, symmetry analysis of fermionic mean field ground states and Gutzwiller projected variational wave functions studies, we propose a quantum spin liquid with spinon Fermi surfaces as a favorable candidate for the ground state of the Heisenberg model on this lattice. We point out implications of this proposal for thermodynamic properties and discuss possible weak instabilities of the spinon Fermi surfaces.