2008/09/30 by Hamid R. Molavian, Michel J. P. Gingras · 1 citation
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Condensed Matter Physics #Multiferroics and related materials #Physics of Superconductivity and Magnetism #cond-mat.stat-mech
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/0953-8984/21/17/172201
published as J. Phys.: Condens. Matter {21}, 172201 (2009) · 6 pages, 3 figures
arxiv created 2009/03/16 · openalex publication_date 2009/03/20 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Despite a Curie-Weiss temperature θ(CW)∼-14 K, the Tb(2)Ti(2)O(7) pyrochlore magnetic material lacks long range magnetic order down to at least T(*)≈50 mK. It has recently been proposed that the low temperature collective paramagnetic or spin liquid regime of this material may be akin to a spin ice state subject to both thermal and quantum fluctuations-a quantum spin ice (QSI) of sorts. Here we explore the effect of a magnetic field B along the [111] direction on the QSI state. To do so, we investigate the magnetic properties of a microscopic model of Tb(2)Ti(2)O(7) in an independent tetrahedron approximation in a finite field B along [111]. Such a model describes semi-quantitatively the collective paramagnetic regime where nontrivial spin correlations start to develop at the shortest length scale, that is over a single tetrahedron, but where no long range order is yet present. Our results show that a magnetization plateau develops at low temperatures as the system develops B = 0 ferromagnetic spin ice like 'two-in/two-out' correlations at the shortest length scale. From these results, we are led to propose that the observation of such a [111] magnetization plateau in Tb(2)Ti(2)O(7) would provide compelling evidence for a QSI at B = 0 in this material and help guide the development of a theory for the origin of its spin liquid state.