Gapless Spin Liquids: Stability and Possible Experimental Relevance

Abstract

For certain crystalline systems, most notably the organic compound EtMe3Sb[Pd(dmit)2]2, experimental evidence has accumulated of an insulating state with a high density of gapless neutral excitations that produce Fermi-liquid-like power laws in thermodynamic quantities and thermal transport. This has been taken as evidence of a fractionalized spin liquid state. In this paper, we argue that if the experiments are taken at face value, the most promising spin liquid candidates are a Z4 spin liquid with a pseudo-Fermi surface and no broken symmetries, or a Z2 spin-liquid with a pseudo-Fermi surface and at least one of the following spontaneously broken: (a) time-reversal and inversion, (b) translation, or (c) certain point-group symmetries. We present a solvable model on the triangular lattice with an (a) type Z2 spin liquid groundstate.

7 pages. v2: added references and discussion of point-group symmetry breaking in Z2 case

References in corpus (46)

• Anyons in an exactly solved model and beyond
• Anomalous Hall effect
• String-net condensation: A physical mechanism for topological phases
• Spin Liquid Ground State of the $S=1/2$ Kagome Heisenberg Model
• Spin Liquid State in an Organic Mott Insulator with Triangular Lattice
• Quantum Orders and Symmetric Spin Liquids
• Spin Dynamics of the Spin-1/2 Kagome Lattice Antiferromagnet ZnCu_3(OH)_6Cl_2
• An RVB phase in the triangular lattice quantum dimer model
• Z_2 Gauge Theory of Electron Fractionalization in Strongly Correlated Systems
• Non Fermi-Liquid States and Pairing of a general Model of Copper-Oxide Metals
• Quantum spin-liquid emerging in two-dimensional correlated Dirac fermions
• Theory of Thermal Hall Effect in Quantum Magnets
• Topological Insulators and Nematic Phases from Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking in 2D Fermi Systems with a Quadratic Band Crossing
• Variational study of triangular lattice spin-1/2 model with ring exchanges and spin liquid state in κ-(ET)_2 Cu_2 (CN)_3
• Quantum orders in an exact soluble model
• U(1) Gauge Theory of the Hubbard Model : Spin Liquid States and Possible Application to k-(BEDT-TTF)_2 Cu_2 (CN)_3
• An exact chiral spin liquid with non-Abelian anyons
• Spin Liquid Ground State of the Spin-1/2 Square $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg Model
• On the low energy properies of fermions with singular interactions
• Fractionalization in an Easy-axis Kagome Antiferromagnet
• Dynamical layer decoupling in a stripe-ordered, high T_c superconductor
• Non-Fermi Liquid Fixed Point in 2+1 Dimensions
• Entanglement and topological entropy of the toric code at finite temperature
• Quantum liquid crystals in imbalanced Fermi gas: fluctuations and fractional vortices in Larkin-Ovchinnikov states
• Orbital magnetic field effects in spin liquid with spinon Fermi sea: Possible application to $\kappa$-(ET)${}_2$Cu${}_2$(CN)${}_3$
• Spin Hamiltonian for which the Chiral Spin Liquid is the Exact Ground State
• Amperean Pairing Instability in the U(1) Spin Liquid State with Fermi Surface and Application to $\kappa -(BEDT-TTF{)}_{2}C{u}_2(CN{)}_3$
• Nature of the spin liquid state of the Hubbard model on honeycomb lattice
• Fluctuations and phase transitions in Larkin-Ovchinnikov liquid crystal states of population-imbalanced resonant Fermi gas
• Algebraic spin liquid in an exactly solvable spin model
• Fermionic magnons, non-Abelian spinons, and spin quantum Hall effect from an exactly solvable Kitaev Hamiltonian with SU(2) symmetry
• Weak Mott insulators on the triangular lattice: possibility of a gapless nematic quantum spin liquid
• Large-$U$ limit of a Hubbard model in a magnetic field: chiral spin interactions and paramagnetism
• Ground-state phase diagram of the quantum J1-J2 model on the honeycomb lattice
• Microscopic models for fractionalized phases in strongly correlated systems
• Modified Sagnac interferometer for high-sensitivity magneto-optic measurements atcryogenic temperatures
• Ground-state phase diagram of the quantum $J_1-J_2$ model on the square lattice
• Perturbative approach to an exactly solved problem: the Kitaev honeycomb model
• Spectral signatures of modulated d-wave superconducting phases
• Exact Chiral Spin Liquid with Stable Spin Fermi Surface on the Kagome Lattice
• Stability of nodal quasi-particles in superconductors with coexisting orders
• SU(2)-invariant spin liquids on the triangular lattice with spinful Majorana excitations
• Spin Liquid Phases for Spin-1 systems on the Triangular lattice
• Nature of a topological quantum phase transition in a chiral spin liquid model
• Bosonic model with $Z_3$ fractionalization
• The Mixed State of a $\pi$-Striped Superconductor

Cited by in corpus (30)

• Quantum Spin Liquid States
• Unusual ordered phases of highly frustrated magnets: a review
• Anomalous metals -- failed superconductors
• Theory of a competitive spin liquid state for weak Mott insulators on the triangular lattice
• Phase diagram of the Hubbard model on the anisotropic triangular lattice
• Thermal conductivity of quantum magnetic monopoles in the frustrated pyrochlore Yb2Ti2O7
• Heat transport study of the spin liquid candidate 1T-TaS2
• Coherent Transmutation of Electrons into Fractionalized Anyons
• Band-structure effects on superconductivity in Hubbard models
• Intertwining topological order and broken symmetry in a theory of fluctuating spin density waves
• Charge-4e superconductors: a Majorana quantum Monte Carlo study
• Bulk Fermi surface of charge-neutral excitations in SmB6 or not: a heat-transport study
• Three Dimensional Z2 Topological Phases enriched by Time-Reversal Symmetry
• Field-Induced Instability of a Gapless Spin Liquid with a Spinon Fermi Surface
• Fermionic spinon theory of square lattice spin liquids near the Néel state
• Insulators and metals with topological order and discrete symmetry breaking
• Possible superconductivity with Bogoliubov Fermi surface in lightly doped Kagome U(1) spin liquid
• Solvable model for a charge-$4e$ superconductor
• Signatures of fractionalization in spin liquids from interlayer thermal transport
• Spin-1/2 kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet: Machine learning discovery of the spinon pair density wave ground state
• Controlled calculation of the thermal conductivity for a spinon Fermi surface coupled to a $U(1)$ gauge field
• Evidence for a Parity Broken Monoclinic Ground State in the S = 1/2 Kagomé Antiferromagnet Herbertsmithite
• Instability of the $U(1)$ spin liquid with a large spinon Fermi surface in the Heisenberg-ring exchange model on the triangular lattice
• Floating topological phases
• Majorana Fermi surface state in a network of quantum spin chains
• Absence of the $T^{2/3}$ specific heat anomaly in a $U(1)$ spin liquid with a large spinon Fermi surface: confinement of slave particles and non-locality of spinons
• Unveiling the Fifth State of Matter: Insights into Ultra-Hot Plasma and its Applications
• Thermal Properties and Instability of a $U(1)$ Spin Liquid on the Triangular Lattice
• Collapse of susceptibility and non-trivial spin dynamics in the hyper-honeycomb magnet $\beta$-Li${}_2$IrO${}_3$ under high pressure
• Spin Liquid Mimicry in the Hydroxide Double Perovskite CuSn(OH)${}_6$ Induced by Correlated Proton Disorder