Dresden 2009 – scientific programme

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MA: Fachverband Magnetismus

MA 18: Spin Structures and Magnetic Phase Transitions

MA 18.9: Talk

Wednesday, March 25, 2009, 12:15–12:30, HSZ 401

Torque anomalies at magnetization plateaux in quantum magnets with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions — •Salvatore R. Manmana and Frédéric Mila — Institute of Theoretical Physics (CTMC), EPF Lausanne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Schweiz

We investigate the effect of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM) interactions on torque measurements of quantum magnets with magnetization plateaux in the context of a frustrated spin-1/2 ladder. Using extensive DMRG simulations, we show that the DM contribution to the torque is peaked at the critical fields, and that the total torque is non-monotonous if the DM interaction is large enough compared to the g-tensor anisotropy. More remarkably, if the DM vectors point in a principal direction of the g-tensor, torque measurements close to this direction will show well defined peaks even for small DM interaction, leading to a very sensitive way to detect the critical fields. We propose to test this effect in the two-dimensional plateau system SrCu₂(BO₃)₂.