Disordered Route to the Coulomb Quantum Spin Liquid: Random Transverse Fields on Spin Ice in ${\mathrm{Pr}}_{2}{\mathrm{Zr}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{7}$

Disordered Route to the Coulomb Quantum Spin Liquid: Random Transverse Fields on Spin Ice in $\Pr_{2} {Zr}_{2} O_{7}$

J.-J. Wen, S. M. Koohpayeh, K. A. Ross, B. A. Trump, T. M. McQueen, K. Kimura, S. Nakatsuji, Y. Qiu, D. M. Pajerowski, J. R. D. Copley, and C. L. Broholm

Phys. Rev. Lett. 118, 107206 – Published 8 March 2017

Abstract

Inelastic neutron scattering reveals a broad continuum of excitations in $\Pr_{2} {Zr}_{2} O_{7}$ , the temperature and magnetic field dependence of which indicate a continuous distribution of quenched transverse fields ( $Δ$ ) acting on the non-Kramers $\Pr^{3 +}$ crystal field ground state doublets. Spin-ice correlations are apparent within 0.2 meV of the Zeeman energy. A random phase approximation provides an excellent account of the data with a transverse field distribution $ρ (Δ) \propto (Δ^{2} + Γ^{2})^{- 1}$ , where $Γ = 0.27 (1) meV$ . Established during high temperature synthesis due to an underlying structural instability, it appears disorder in $\Pr_{2} {Zr}_{2} O_{7}$ actually induces a quantum spin liquid.

Received 27 September 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.107206

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Frustrated magnetism Quantum spin liquid Spin ice

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

J.-J. Wen^1,2,3, S. M. Koohpayeh¹, K. A. Ross^1,4, B. A. Trump⁵, T. M. McQueen^1,5,6, K. Kimura^7,8, S. Nakatsuji^7,9, Y. Qiu⁴, D. M. Pajerowski⁴, J. R. D. Copley⁴, and C. L. Broholm^1,4,6

¹Institute for Quantum Matter and Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA
²Department of Applied Physics, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA
³Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, 2575 Sand Hill Road, Menlo Park, California 94025, USA
⁴NIST Center for Neutron Research, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, Maryland 20899, USA
⁵Department of Chemistry, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA
⁶Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA
⁷Institute for Solid State Physics (ISSP), University of Tokyo, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8581, Japan
⁸Division of Materials Physics, Graduate School of Engineering Science, Osaka University, Toyonaka, Osaka 560-8531, Japan
⁹CREST, Japan Science and Technology Agency, Kawaguchi, Saitama 332-0012, Japan