Evidence of the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless Phase in a Frustrated Magnet
| Autor: | Hu, Ze, Ma, Zhen, Liao, Yuan-Da, Li, Han, Ma, Chunsheng, Cui, Yi, Shangguan, Yanyan, Huang, Zhentao, Qi, Yang, Li, Wei, Meng, Zi Yang, Wen, Jinsheng, Yu, Weiqiang |
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| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Nature Communications 11, 5631 (2020) |
| Druh dokumentu: | Working Paper |
| DOI: | 10.1038/s41467-020-19380-x |
| Popis: | The Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) mechanism, building upon proliferation of topological defects in 2D systems, is the first example of phase transition beyond the Landau-Ginzburg paradigm of symmetry breaking. Such a topological phase transition has long been sought yet undiscovered directly in magnetic materials. Here, we pin down two transitions that bound a BKT phase in an ideal 2D frustrated magnet TmMgGaO$_4$, via nuclear magnetic resonance under in-plane magnetic fields, which do not disturb the low-energy electronic states and allow BKT fluctuations to be detected sensitively. Moreover, by applying out-of-plane fields, we find a critical scaling behaviour of the magnetic susceptibility expected for the BKT transition. The experimental findings can be explained by quantum Monte Carlo simulations applied on an accurate triangular-lattice Ising model of the compound which hosts a BKT phase. These results provide a concrete example for the BKT phase and offer an ideal platform for future investigations on the BKT physics in magnetic materials. Comment: Version as accepted by Nature Communications, main text: 7 pages, 3 figures; supplementary information: 5 pages, 7 figures |
| Databáze: | arXiv |
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