Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Materializing rival ground states in the barlowite family of kagome magnets: quantum spin liquid, spin ordered, and valence bond crystal states

Journal Article · · npj Quantum Materials
 [1]; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
  1. SIMES
The spin- 12 kagome antiferromagnet is considered an ideal host for a quantum spin liquid ground state. We find that when the bonds of the kagome lattice are modulated with a periodic pattern, new quantum ground states emerge. Newly synthesized crystalline barlowite (Cu4(OH)6FBr) and Zn-substituted barlowite demonstrate the delicate interplay between singlet states and spin order on the spin- 12 kagome lattice. Comprehensive structural measurements demonstrate that our new variant of barlowite maintains hexagonal symmetry at low temperatures with an arrangement of distorted and undistorted kagome triangles, for which numerical simulations predict a pinwheel va- lence bond crystal (VBC) state instead of a quantum spin liquid (QSL). The presence of interlayer spins eventually leads to an interesting pinwheel q=0 magnetic order. Partially Zn-substituted bar- lowite (Cu3.44Zn0.56(OH)6FBr) has an ideal kagome lattice and shows QSL behavior, indicating a surprising robustness of the QSL against interlayer impurities. The magnetic susceptibility is simi- lar to that of herbertsmithite, even though the Cu2+ impurities are above the percolation threshold for the interlayer lattice and they couple more strongly to the nearest kagome moment. This system is a unique playground displaying QSL, VBC, and spin order, furthering our understanding of these highly competitive quantum states.
Research Organization:
Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Advanced Photon Source (APS); Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
National Science Foundation (NSF); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22). Materials Sciences & Engineering Division
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231; AC02-06CH11357; AC02-76SF00515; AC05-00OR22725
OSTI ID:
1602253
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1617810
Journal Information:
npj Quantum Materials, Journal Name: npj Quantum Materials Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 5; ISSN 2397-4648
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (64)

Structural phase transitions of clinoatacamite and the dynamic Jahn–Teller effect journal November 2016
Quantum kagome frustrated antiferromagnets: One route to quantum spin liquids journal March 2016
Synthesis-dependent properties of barlowite and Zn-substituted barlowite journal December 2018
Neutron Scattering with a Triple-Axis Spectrometer book January 2009
Structural Phase Transition in the S = 1 / 2 Kagome System Cs 2 ZrCu 3 F 12 and a Comparison to the Valence-Bond-Solid Phase in Rb 2 SnCu 3 F 12 journal September 2011
A Structurally Perfect S = 1 / 2 Kagomé Antiferromagnet journal October 2005
Site Specific X-ray Anomalous Dispersion of the Geometrically Frustrated Kagomé Magnet, Herbertsmithite, ZnCu 3 (OH) 6 Cl 2 journal November 2010
Spin liquids in frustrated magnets journal March 2010
Fractionalized excitations in the spin-liquid state of a kagome-lattice antiferromagnet journal December 2012
Pinwheel valence-bond solid and triplet excitations in the two-dimensional deformed kagome lattice journal September 2010
Identifying topological order by entanglement entropy journal November 2012
Order–disorder transition in the S = ½ kagome antiferromagnets claringbullite and barlowite journal January 2019
Quantum spin liquids: a review journal November 2016
Gapped Spin-1/2 Spinon Excitations in a New Kagome Quantum Spin Liquid Compound Cu 3 Zn(OH) 6 FBr journal June 2017
From Claringbullite to a New Spin Liquid Candidate Cu 3 Zn(OH) 6 FCl journal December 2018
Structural and magnetic phase transitions of AV 6 O 11 (A = Na, Sr, and Pb) journal September 2001
On the crystal and magnetic ordering structures of clinoatacamite, γ-Cu 2 (OD) 3 Cl, a proposed valence bond solid journal November 2008
Kagome´- and triangular-lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnets: Ordering from quantum fluctuations and quantum-disordered ground states with unconfined bosonic spinons journal June 1992
Dirac structure, RVB, and Goldstone modes in the kagomé antiferromagnet journal December 2000
Hidden long-range order in kagomé Heisenberg antiferromagnets journal October 2002
Physics of low-energy singlet states of the Kagome lattice quantum Heisenberg antiferromagnet journal December 2003
Low temperature magnetization of the S = 1 2 kagome antiferromagnet Zn Cu 3 ( O H ) 6 Cl 2 journal October 2007
Ground state of the spin-1/2 kagome-lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnet journal November 2007
X-ray scattering study of the spin-Peierls transition and soft phonon behavior in TiOCl journal December 2007
Properties of an algebraic spin liquid on the kagome lattice journal June 2008
Schwinger-boson approach to the kagome antiferromagnet with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions: Phase diagram and dynamical structure factors journal February 2010
Quantum criticality of the kagome antiferromagnet with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions journal April 2010
Synthesis and characterization of single crystals of the spin- 1 2 kagome-lattice antiferromagnets Zn x Cu 4 − x (OH) 6 Cl 2 journal March 2011
Spin- 1 2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the kagome lattice: Z 2 spin liquid with fermionic spinons journal June 2013
First-principles determination of Heisenberg Hamiltonian parameters for the spin- 1 2 kagome antiferromagnet ZnCu 3 (OH) 6 Cl 2 journal August 2013
Renormalization group analysis of competing quantum phases in the J 1 - J 2 Heisenberg model on the kagome lattice journal January 2014
Chiral and critical spin liquids in a spin- 1 2 kagome antiferromagnet journal July 2015
Barlowite as a canted antiferromagnet: Theory and experiment journal September 2015
Selectively doping barlowite for quantum spin liquid: A first-principles study journal December 2015
Anisotropy: Spin order and magnetization of single-crystalline Cu 4 ( OH ) 6 FBr barlowite journal June 2016
Correlated impurities and intrinsic spin-liquid physics in the kagome material herbertsmithite journal August 2016
Reduction of magnetic interlayer coupling in barlowite through isoelectronic substitution journal September 2016
Gapped spin liquid with Z 2 topological order for the kagome Heisenberg model journal June 2017
Effect of Zn doping on the antiferromagnetism in kagome Cu 4 − x Zn x ( OH ) 6 FBr journal October 2018
Bond and site percolation in three dimensions journal May 2013
External Magnetic Field Effects on a Distorted Kagome Antiferromagnet journal September 2008
Density Matrix Renormalization Group Numerical Study of the Kagome Antiferromagnet journal September 2008
Refining the Spin Hamiltonian in the Spin- 1 2 Kagome Lattice Antiferromagnet ZnCu 3 ( OH ) 6 Cl 2 Using Single Crystals journal April 2012
Nature of the Spin-Liquid Ground State of the S = 1 / 2 Heisenberg Model on the Kagome Lattice journal August 2012
Striped Spin Liquid Crystal Ground State Instability of Kagome Antiferromagnets journal November 2013
Barlowite: A Spin- 1 / 2 Antiferromagnet with a Geometrically Perfect Kagome Motif journal November 2014
Gapless Spin-Liquid Ground State in the S = 1 / 2 Kagome Antiferromagnet journal March 2017
Density matrix formulation for quantum renormalization groups journal November 1992
Spin Dynamics of the Spin- 1 / 2 Kagome Lattice Antiferromagnet ZnCu 3 ( OH ) 6 Cl 2 journal March 2007
Projected-Wave-Function Study of the Spin- 1 / 2 Heisenberg Model on the Kagomé Lattice journal March 2007
Single-crystal growth of C u 4 ( OH ) 6 BrF and universal behavior in quantum spin liquid candidates synthetic barlowite and herbertsmithite journal April 2018
Nuclear and magnetic structures of the frustrated quantum antiferromagnet barlowite, Cu 4 ( OH ) 6 FBr journal November 2018
Colloquium : Herbertsmithite and the search for the quantum spin liquid journal December 2016
OLEX2 : a complete structure solution, refinement and analysis program journal January 2009
VESTA 3 for three-dimensional visualization of crystal, volumetric and morphology data journal October 2011
GSAS-II : the genesis of a modern open-source all purpose crystallography software package journal March 2013
Bilbao Crystallographic Server. II. Representations of crystallographic point groups and space groups journal March 2006
Crystal structure refinement with SHELXL journal January 2015
Spin-Liquid Ground State of the S = 1/2 Kagome Heisenberg Antiferromagnet journal April 2011
Evidence for a gapped spin-liquid ground state in a kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet journal November 2015
Symmetry-Based Computational Tools for Magnetic Crystallography journal July 2015
Herbertsmithite, Cu 3 Zn(OH) 6 Cl 2 , a new species, and the definition of paratacamite journal June 2004
Claringbullite, a new hydrated copper chloride journal December 1977
Barlowite, Cu 4 FBr(OH) 6 , a new mineral isotructural with claringbullite: description and crystal structure journal December 2014