A System Exhibiting Toroidal Order

A two dimensional system of discs upon which a triangle of spins are mounted is shown to undergo a sequence of interesting phase transitions as the temperature is lowered. We are mainly concerned with the `solid' phase in which bond orientational order but not positional order is long ranged. As the temperature is lowered in the `solid' phase, the first phase transition involving the orientation or toroidal charge of the discs is into a `gauge toroid' phase in which the product of a magnetic toroidal parameter and an orientation variable (for the discs) orders but due to a local gauge symmetry these variables themselves do not individually order. Finally, in the lowest temperature phase the gauge symmetry is broken and toroidal order and orientational order both develop. In the `gauge toroidal' phase time reversal invariance is broken and in the lowest temperature phase inversion symmetry is also broken. In none of these phases is there long range order in any Fourier component of the average spin. A definition of the toroidal magnetic moment $T_i$ of the $i$th plaquette is proposed such that the magnetostatic interaction between plaquettes $i$ and $j$ is proportional to $T_iT_j$. Symmetry considerations are used to construct the magnetoelectric free energy and thereby to deduce which coefficients of the linear magnetoelectric tensor are allowed to be nonzero. In none of the phases does symmetry permit a spontaneous polarization.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure

Landau Theory of Tilting of Oxygen Octahedra in Perovskites

The list of possible commensurate phases obtained from the parent tetragonal phase of Ruddlesden-Popper systems, A$_{n+1}$B$_n$C$_{3n+1}$ for general $n$ due to a single phase transition involving the reorienting of octahedra of C (oxygen) ions is reexamined using a Landau expansion. This expansion allows for the nonlinearity of the octahedral rotations and the rotation-strain coupling. It is found that most structures allowed by symmetry are inconsistent with the constraint of rigid octahedra which dictates the form of the quartic terms in the Landau free energy. For A$_2$BC$_4$ our analysis allows only 10 (see Table III) of the 41 structures listed by Hatch {\it et al.} which are allowed by general symmetry arguments. The symmetry of rotations for RP systems with $n>2$ is clarified. Our list of possible structures in Table VII excludes many structures allowed in previous studies.Comment: 21 pages, 21 figures. An elaboration of arXiv:1012.512

Charge and Spin Ordering in the Mixed Valence Compound LuFe2O4

Landau theory and symmetry considerations lead us to propose an explanation for several seemingly paradoxical behaviors of charge ordering (CO) and spin ordering (SO) in the mixed valence compound LuFe2O4. Both SO and CO are highly frustrated. We analyze a lattice gas model of CO within mean field theory and determine the magnitude of several of the phenomenological interactions. We show that the assumption of a continuous phase transition at which CO or SO develops implies that both CO and SO are incommensurate. To explain how ferroelectric fluctuations in the charge disordered phase can be consistent with an antiferroelectric ordered phase, we invoke an electron-phonon interaction in which a low energy (20meV) zone-center transverse phonon plays a key role. The energies of all the zone-center phonons are calculated from first principles. We give a Landau analysis which explains SO and we discuss a model of interactions which stabilizes the SO state, if it is assumed commensurate. However, we suggest a high resolution experimental determination to see whether this phase is really commensurate, as believed up to now. The applicability of representation analysis is discussed. A tentative explanation for the sensitivity of the CO state to an applied magnetic field in field-cooled experiments is given.Comment: 36 pages, 17 figure

Spin Dynamics of Trimers on a Distorted Kagom\'e Lattice

We treat the ground state, elementary excitations, and neutron scattering cross section for a system of trimers consisting of three tightly bound spins 1/2 on a distorted Kagom\'e lattice, subject to isotropic nearest neighbor (usually antiferromagnetic) Heisenberg interactions. The interactions between trimers are assumed to be weak compared to the intra trimer interactions. We compare the spin-wave excitation spectrum of trimers with that obtained from standard spin-wave theory and attribute the differences at low energy to the fact that the trimer formulation includes exactly the effects of intra-trimer zero point motion. Application to existing systems is briefly discussed.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figure

Nonlocal Modulation of Entangled Photons

We consider ramifications of the use of high speed light modulators to questions of correlation and measurement of time-energy entangled photons. Using phase modulators, we find that temporal modulation of one photon of an entangled pair, as measured by correlation in the frequency domain, may be negated or enhanced by modulation of the second photon. Using amplitude modulators we describe a Fourier technique for measurement of biphoton wave functions with slow detectors