Low-field behavior of an XY pyrochlore antiferromagnet: emergent clock anisotropies

Abstract

Using $\mathrm{E}{\mathrm{r}}_2\mathrm{T}{\mathrm{i}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_7$ as a motivation, we investigate finite-field properties of $XY$ pyrochlore antiferromagnets. In addition to a fluctuation-induced six-fold anisotropy present in zero field, an external magnetic field induces a combination of two-, three-, and six-fold clock terms as a function of its orientation providing for a rich and controllable magnetothermodynamics. For $\mathrm{E}{\mathrm{r}}_2\mathrm{T}{\mathrm{i}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_7$, we predict a new phase transition for $\mathbf{H}\parallel [001]$. Re-entrant transitions are also found for $\mathbf{H}\parallel [111]$. We extend these results to the whole family the $XY$ pyrochlore antiferromagnets and show that presence and number of low-field transitions for different orientations can be used for locating a given material in the parameter space of anisotropic pyrochlores. Finite-temperature classical Monte Carlo simulations serve to confirm and illustrate these analytic predictions.

11 pages, accepted version with supplemental material

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Cited by in corpus (11)

• Frustrated quantum rare-earth pyrochlores
• Experimental Insights into Ground State Selection of Quantum XY Pyrochlores
• Magnetic dilution and domain selection in the XY pyrochlore antiferromagnet Er${}_2$Ti${}_2$O${}_7$
• Understanding Reentrance in Frustrated Magnets: the Case of the Er${}_2$Sn${}_2$O${}_7$ Pyrochlore
• Control of effective free energy landscape in a frustrated magnet by a field pulse
• Noncoplanar multi-k states in frustrated spinel and kagome magnets
• Field induced phase diagram of the XY pyrochlore antiferromagnet Er${}_2$Ti${}_2$O${}_7$
• Order-by-disorder without quantum zero-point fluctuations in the pyrochlore Heisenberg ferromagnet with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions
• Experimental evidence for field induced emergent clock anisotropies in the XY pyrochlore Er${}_2$Ti${}_2$O${}_7$
• $J_{\mathrm{eff}}$ = 1/2 Hyperoctagon Lattice in Cobalt Oxalate Metal-Organic-Framework
• Chiral and Clock phases in Twisted Dipolar Clusters