Heavy fermion spin liquid in herbertsmithite

Abstract

We analyze recent heat capacity measurements in herbertsmithite $\mathrm{ZnC}{\mathrm{u}}_3(\mathrm{OH}{)}_6\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{l}}_2$ single crystal samples subjected to strong magnetic fields. We show that the temperature dependence of specific heat $C_{mag}$ formed by quantum spin liquid at different magnetic fields $B$ resembles the electronic heat capacity $C_{el}$ of the HF metal $\mathrm{YbR}{\mathrm{h}}_2\mathrm{S}{\mathrm{i}}_2$. We demonstrate that the spinon effective mass $M_{mag}^{\ast }\propto C_{mag}/T$ exhibits a scaling behavior like that of $C_{el}/T$. We also show that the recent measurements of $C_{mag}$ are compatible with those obtained on powder samples. These observations allow us to conclude that $\mathrm{ZnC}{\mathrm{u}}_3(\mathrm{OH}{)}_6\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{l}}_2$ holds a stable strongly correlated quantum spin liquid, and a possible gap in the spectra of spinon excitations is absent even under the application of very high magnetic fields of 18 T.

5 pages, 5 figures

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• Fractionalized excitations in the spin liquid state of a kagomé lattice antiferromagnet
• Spin Dynamics of the Spin-1/2 Kagome Lattice Antiferromagnet ZnCu_3(OH)_6Cl_2
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• Topological excitations and the dynamic structure factor of spin liquids on the kagome lattice
• Scaling Behavior of Heavy Fermion Metals
• Algebraic vortex liquid theory of a quantum antiferromagnet on the kagome lattice
• Scaling in Dynamic Susceptibility of Herbertsmithite and Heavy-Fermion Metals
• General properties of phase diagrams of heavy-fermion metals

Cited by in corpus (3)

• New state of matter: heavy-fermion systems, quantum spin liquids, quasicrystals, cold gases, and high temperature superconductors
• Infrared phonons as a probe of a spin-liquid states in herbertsmithite ZnCu3(OH)6Cl2
• Thermodynamic, dynamic and transport properties of quantum spin liquid in herbertsmithite from experimental and theoretical point of view