We study electronic instabilities of a kagome metal with a Fermi energy close to saddle points at the hexagonal Brillouin zone face centers. Using parquet renormalization group, we determine the leading and subleading instabilities, finding supercond
ucting, charge, orbital moment, and spin density waves. We then derive and use Landau theory to discuss how different primary density wave orders give rise to charge density wave modulations, as seen in the AV$_3$Sb$_5$ family, with A=K,Rb,Cs. The results provide strong constraints on the mechanism of charge ordering and how it can be further refined from existing and future experiments.
The Phonon Hall Viscosity is the leading term evincing time-reversal symmetry breaking in the low energy description of lattice phonons. It may generate phonon Berry curvature, and can be observed experimentally through the acoustic Faraday effect an
d thermal Hall transport. We present a systematic procedure to obtain the phonon Hall viscosity induced by phonon-magnon interactions in magnetic insulators under an external magnetic field. We obtain a general symmetry criterion that leads to non-zero Faraday rotation and Hall conductivity, and clarify the interplay between lattice symmetry, spin-orbit-coupling, external magnetic field and magnetic ordering. The symmetry analysis is verified through a microscopic calculation. By constructing the general symmetry-allowed effective action that describes the spin dynamics and spin-lattice coupling, and then integrating out the spin fluctuations, the leading order time-reversal breaking term in the phonon effective action, i.e. the phonon Hall viscosity, can be obtained. The analysis of the square lattice antiferromagnet for a cuprate Mott insulator, Sr$_2$CuO$_2$Cl$_2$, is presented explicitly, and the procedure described here can be readily generalized to other magnetic insulators.
Twisted bilayer graphene (TBG) aligned with hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) substrate can exhibit an anomalous Hall effect at 3/4 filling due to the spontaneous valley polarization in valley resolved moire bands with opposite Chern number [Science 367
, 900 (2020), Science 365, 605 (2019)]. It was observed that a small DC current is able to switch the valley polarization and reverse the sign of the Hall conductance [Science 367, 900 (2020), Science 365, 605 (2019)]. Here, we discuss the mechanism of the current switching of valley polarization near the transition temperature, where bulk dissipative transport dominates. We show that for a sample with rotational symmetry breaking, a DC current may generate an electron density difference between the two valleys (valley density difference). The current induced valley density difference in turn induces a first order transition in the valley polarization. We emphasize that the inter-valley scattering plays a central role since it is the channel for exchanging electrons between the two valleys. We further estimate the valley density difference in the TBG/h-BN system with a microscopic model, and find a significant enhancement of the effect in the magic angle regime.
We investigate the generic features of the low energy dynamical spin structure factor of the Kitaev honeycomb quantum spin liquid perturbed away from its exact soluble limit by generic symmetry-allowed exchange couplings. We find that the spin gap pe
rsists in the Kitaev-Heisenberg model, but generally vanishes provided more generic symmetry-allowed interactions exist. We formulate the generic expansion of the spin operator in terms of fractionalized Majorana fermion operators according to the symmetry enriched topological order of the Kitaev spin liquid, described by its projective symmetry group. The dynamical spin structure factor displays power-law scaling bounded by Dirac cones in the vicinity of the $Gamma$, $K$ and $K$ points of the Brillouin zone, rather than the spin gap found for the exactly soluble point.
Despite possessing a local spin $2$ moment on the iron site and a Curie-Weiss temperature of $45K$, the A site spinel FeSc$_2$S$_4$ does not magnetically order down to 50mK. Previous theoretical work by Chen and Balents advanced an explanation for th
is observation in the form of the $J_2$-$lambda$ model which places FeSc$_2$S$_4$ close to a quantum critical point on the disordered side of a quantum phase transition between a N{e}el ordered phase and a Spin-Orbital Liquid in which spins and orbitals are entangled, quenching the magnetization. We present new theoretical studies of the optical properties of the $J_2$-$lambda$ model, including a computation of the dispersion relation for the quasiparticle excitations and the form of the collective response to electric field. We argue that the latter directly probes a low energy excitation continuum characteristic of quantum criticality, and that our results reinforce the consistency of this model with experiment.
We study the quantum phase diagram of the spin-$1/2$ Heisenberg model on the kagome lattice with first-, second-, and third-neighbor interactions $J_1$, $J_2$, and $J_3$ by means of density matrix renormalization group. For small $J_2$ and $J_3$, thi
s model sustains a time-reversal invariant quantum spin liquid phase. With increasing $J_2$ and $J_3$, we find in addition a $q=(0,0)$ N{e}el phase, a chiral spin liquid phase, a valence-bond crystal phase, and a complex non-coplanar magnetically ordered state with spins forming the vertices of a cuboctahedron known as a cuboc1 phase. Both the chiral spin liquid and cuboc1 phase break time reversal symmetry in the sense of spontaneous scalar spin chirality. We show that the chiralities in the chiral spin liquid and cuboc1 are distinct, and that these two states are separated by a strong first order phase transition. The transitions from the chiral spin liquid to both the $q=(0,0)$ phase and to time-reversal symmetric spin liquid, however, are consistent with continuous quantum phase transitions.
We construct the general free energy governing long-wavelength magnetism in two-dimensional oxide heterostructures, which applies irrespective of the microscopic mechanism for magnetism. This leads, in the relevant regime of weak but non-negligible s
pin-orbit coupling, to a rich phase diagram containing in-plane ferromagnetic, spiral, cone, and skyrmion lattice phases, as well as a nematic state stabilized by thermal fluctuations. The general conclusions are vetted by a microscopic derivation for a simple model with Rashba spin-orbit coupling.
We construct and analyze a microscopic model for insulating rock salt ordered double perovskites, with the chemical formula A$_2$BBO$_6$, where the B atom has a 4d$^1$ or 5d$^1$ electronic configuration and forms a face centered cubic (fcc) lattice.
The combination of the triply-degenerate $t_{2g}$ orbital and strong spin-orbit coupling forms local quadruplets with an effective spin moment $j=3/2$. Moreover, due to strongly orbital-dependent exchange, the effective spins have substantial biquadratic and bicubic interactions (fourth and sixth order in the spins, respectively). This leads, at the mean field level, to three main phases: an unusual antiferromagnet with dominant octupolar order, a ferromagnetic phase with magnetization along the $[110]$ direction, and a non-magnetic but quadrupolar ordered phase, which is stabilized by thermal fluctuations and intermediate temperatures. All these phases have a two sublattice structure described by the ordering wavevector ${boldsymbol Q} =2pi (001)$. We consider quantum fluctuations and argue that in the regime of dominant antiferromagnetic exchange, a non-magnetic valence bond solid or quantum spin liquid state may be favored instead. Candidate quantum spin liquid states and their basic properties are described. We also address the effect of single-site anisotropy driven by lattice distortions. Existing and possible future experiments are discussed in light of these results.
The antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model on an anisotropic kagome lattice may be a good minimal model for real magnetic systems as well as a limit from which the isotropic case can be better understood. We therefore study the nearest-neighbor Heisenber
g antiferromagnet on an anisotropic kagome lattice in a magnetic field. Such a system should be well described by weakly interacting spin chains, and we motivate a general form for the interaction by symmetry considerations and by perturbatively projecting out the inter-chain spins. In the spin 1/2 case, we find that the system exhibits a quantum phase transition from a ferrimagnetic ordered state to an XY ordered state as the field is increased. Finally, we discuss the appearance of magnetization plateaux in the ferrimagnetic phase.
We describe characteristic physical properties of the recently introduced class of deconfined quantum critical points. Using some simple models, we highlight observables which clearly distinguish such critical points from those described by the conve
ntional Landau-Ginzburg-Wilson framework: such a distinction can be made quite precisely even though both classes of critical points are strongly coupled, and neither has sharp quasiparticle excitations. We also contrast our classification from proposals by Bernevig et al. (cond-mat/0004291) and Yoshioka et al. (cond-mat/0404427).
