Abstract
Low dimensional quantum magnets are interesting because of the emerging collective behavior arising from strong quantum fluctuations. The one-dimensional (1D) S = 1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet is a paradigmatic example, whose low-energy excitations, known as spinons, carry fractional spin S = 1/2. These fractional modes can be reconfined by the application of a staggered magnetic field. Even though considerable progress has been made in the theoretical understanding of such magnets, experimental realizations of this low-dimensional physics are relatively rare. This is particularly true for rare-earth-based magnets because of the large effective spin anisotropy induced by the combination of strong spin–orbit coupling and crystal field splitting. Here, we demonstrate that the rare-earth perovskite YbAlO 3 provides a realization of a quantum spin S = 1/2 chain material exhibiting both quantum critical Tomonaga–Luttinger liquid behavior and spinon confinement–deconfinement transitions in different regions of magnetic field–temperature phase diagram.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 698 |
| Journal | Nature Communications |
| Volume | 10 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Dec 1 2019 |
Funding
We would like to thank G. Loutts for the help with single crystal growth, C. Klausnitzer for the help with magnetization measurements, and I. Zaliznyak, F. Ronning, M. C. Aronson, and E.-J. Guo for useful discussions. This research used resources at the High Flux Isotope Reactor and Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Research supported in part by the Laboratory Directed Research and Development Program of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, managed by UT-Battelle, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy. This work is partly supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences (BES), Materials Science and Engineering Division. This work used resources of the Compute and Data Environment for Science (CADES) at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725. This research used resources of the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, which is a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported under Contract DE-AC05-00OR22725. L.V. acknowledges Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Sciences for partial support under project “Feryt”. Z.W. and C.D.B. are supported by funding from the Lincoln Chair of Excellence in Physics and by the LANL Directed Research and Development program. S.E.N. acknowledges support from the International Max Planck Research School for Chemistry and Physics of Quantum Materials (IMPRS-CPQM). A.C. is partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Materials Sciences and Engineering Division. W. Z. is supported by U.S. DOE through the LANL LDRD Program. M.B. would like to thank the DFG for financial support from project BR 4110/1-1.