Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice

Details Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice

2012-04-05

arxiv.org/abs/1204.1325v1

Physics

Condensed Matter

Strongly Correlated Electrons

26 pages, 18 figures

Scientific paper

The "spin ice" state found in the rare earth pyrochlore magnets Ho2Ti2O7 and Dy2Ti2O7 offers a beautiful realisation of classical magnetostatics, complete with magnetic monopole excitations. It has been suggested that in "quantum spin ice" materials, quantum-mechanical tunnelling between different ice configurations could convert the magnetostatics of spin ice into a quantum spin liquid which realises a fully dynamical, lattice-analogue of quantum electromagnetism. Here we explore how such a state might manifest itself in experiment, within the minimal microscopic model of a such a quantum spin ice. We develop a lattice field theory for this model, and use this to make explicit predictions for the dynamical structure factor which would be observed in neutron scattering experiments on a quantum spin ice. We find that "pinch points", which are the signal feature of a classical spin ice, fade away as a quantum ice is cooled to its zero-temperature ground state. We also make explicit predictions for the ghostly, linearly dispersing magnetic excitations which are the "photons" of this emergent electromagnetism. The predictions of this field theory are shown to be in quantitative agreement with Quantum Monte Carlo simulations at zero temperature.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Seeing the light : experimental signatures of emergent electromagnetism in a quantum spin ice will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-213770