Four-spin-exchange- and magnetic-field-induced chiral order in two-leg spin ladders

Abstract

We propose a mechanism of a vector chiral long-range order in two-leg spin-1/2 and spin-1 antiferromagnetic ladders with four-spin exchanges and a Zeeman term. It is known that for one-dimensional quantum systems, spontaneous breakdown of continuous symmetries is generally forbidden. Any vector chiral order hence does not appear in spin-rotationally [SU(2)]-symmetric spin ladders. However, if a magnetic field is added along the S^z axis of ladders and the SU(2) symmetry is reduced to the U(1) one, the z component of a vector chiral order can emerge with the remaining U(1) symmetry unbroken. Making use of Abelian bosonization techniques, we actually show that a certain type of four-spin exchange can yield a vector chiral long-range order in spin-1/2 and spin-1 ladders under a magnetic field. In the chiral-ordered phase, the Z_2 interchain-parity (i.e., chain-exchange) symmetry is spontaneously broken. We also consider effects of perturbations breaking the parity symmetry.

8 pages, 1 figure, RevTex, published version

References in corpus (5)

• Implementation of Spin Hamiltonians in Optical Lattices
• Spin nematic correlations in bilinear-biquadratic S=1 spin chains
• Phase Diagram of a Spin Ladder with Cyclic Four Spin Exchange
• Mechanisms of degeneracy breaking in pyrochlore antiferromagnets
• Competing Orders and Hidden Duality Symmetries in Two-leg Spin Ladder Systems

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• Constructing Landau framework for topological order: Quantum chains and ladders
• Antiferromagnetic ordering of energy levels for spin ladder with four-spin cyclic exchange: Generalization of the Lieb-Mattis theorem
• Dynamics in two-leg spin ladder with a four-spin cyclic interaction
• Symmetry, topology, duality, chirality, and criticality in a spin-1/2 XXZ ladder with a four-spin interaction
• Quantized Berry Phases of a Spin-1/2 Frustrated Two-Leg Ladder with Four-Spin Exchange
• Competing phases and critical behavior in three coupled spinless Luttinger liquids
• Spontaneous time-reversal symmetry breaking without magnetism in a $S=1$ chain