6533b860fe1ef96bd12c3c0d
RESEARCH PRODUCT
Heavy fermion spin liquid in herbertsmithite
Vladimir A. StephanovichAlfred Z. MsezaneVasily R. ShaginyanVasily R. ShaginyanKonstantin G. PopovM. Ya. Amusiasubject
PhysicsStrongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)Condensed matter physicsFOS: Physical sciencesGeneral Physics and Astronomyengineering.materialHeat capacitySpinonMagnetic fieldCondensed Matter - Strongly Correlated ElectronsEffective mass (solid-state physics)engineeringCondensed Matter::Strongly Correlated ElectronsHerbertsmithiteStrongly correlated materialFermi liquid theoryQuantum spin liquiddescription
We analyze recent heat capacity measurements in herbertsmithite $\rm ZnCu_3(OH)_6Cl_2$ 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 $\rm YbRh_2Si_2$. We demonstrate that the spinon effective mass $M^*_{mag}\propto C_{mag}/T$ 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 $\rm ZnCu_3(OH)_6Cl_2$ 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.
| year | journal | country | edition | language |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015-01-01 | Physics Letters A |