Multiple Coulomb phases with temperature tunable ice rules in pyrochlore spin crossover materials

Abstract

Spin crossover molecules have two accessible states: high spin (HS) and low spin (LS). We show that, on the pyrochlore lattice, elastic interactions between SCO molecules can give rise to three spin-state ice phases. Each is a ``Coulomb phase'' where a local ice-rule can be mapped to a divergence free gauge field and the low energy excitations carry a spin fractionalized midway between the LS and HS states. The unique nature of spin crossover materials allows temperature to change the ice rules allowing straightforward access to Coulomb phases not yet observed in water or spin ices.

6+3 pages, 5+5 figures

References in corpus (7)

• Advances in the Physics of Magnetic Skyrmions and Perspective for Technology
• Dirac Strings and Magnetic Monopoles in Spin Ice Dy2Ti2O7
• Simple Two-Dimensional Model for the Elastic Origin of Cooperativity among Spin States of Spin-Crossover Complexes
• Realization of the mean-field universality class in spin-crossover materials
• Monte Carlo simulation of pressure-induced phase transitions in spin-crossover materials
• Structure-property relationships and the mechanisms of multistep transitions in spin crossover materials and frameworks
• Emergent particles and gauge fields in quantum matter

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Structure-property relationships and the mechanisms of multistep transitions in spin crossover materials and frameworks
• Spin-state smectics in spin crossover materials
• Exact mapping from short-ranged harmonic elastic models of spin crossover materials to Ising models with interactions at all length scales