A microscopic mechanism for rejuvenation and memory effects in spin glasses

Aging in spin glasses (and in some other systems) reveals astonishing effects of `rejuvenation and memory' upon temperature changes. In this paper, we propose microscopic mechanisms (at the scale of spin-spin interactions) which can be at the origin of such phenomena. Firstly, we recall that, in a frustrated system, the effective average interaction between two spins may take different values (possibly with opposite signs) at different temperatures. We give simple examples of such situations, which we compute exactly. Such mechanisms can explain why new ordering processes (rejuvenation) seem to take place in spin glasses when the temperature is lowered. Secondly, we emphasize the fact that inhomogeneous interactions do naturally lead to a wide distribution of relaxation times for thermally activated flips. `Memory spots' spontaneously appear, in the sense that the flipping time of some spin clusters becomes extremely long when the temperature is decreased. Such memory spots are capable of keeping the memory of previous ordering at a higher temperature while new ordering processes occur at a lower temperature. After a qualitative discussion of these mechanisms, we show in the numerical simulation of a simplified example that this may indeed work. Our conclusion is that certain chaos-like phenomena may show up spontaneously in any frustrated and inhomogeneous magnetic system, without impeding the occurrence of memory effects.Comment: 9 pages (11 figures) - revised version, to appear in Eur. Phys. J. B (2001

Fluctuations and vortex pattern ordering in fully frustrated XY model with honeycomb lattice

The accidental degeneracy of various ground states in a fully frustrated XY model with a honeycomb lattice is shown to survive even when the free energy of the harmonic fluctuations is taken into account. The reason for that consists in the existence of a hidden gauge symmetry between the Hamiltonians describing the harmonic fluctuations in all these ground states. A particular vortex pattern is selected only when anharmonic fluctuations are taken into account. However, the observation of vortex ordering requires relatively large system size L>>100000.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, RevTeX4, a different method is used to find which state is selected by anharmonic fluctuations, the last third of the text is completly rewritte

Feedback Effect on Landau-Zener-Stueckelberg Transitions in Magnetic Systems

We examine the effect of the dynamics of the internal magnetic field on the staircase magnetization curves observed in large-spin molecular magnets. We show that the size of the magnetization steps depends sensitively on the intermolecular interactions, even if these are very small compared to the intra-molecular couplings.Comment: 4 pages, 3 Postscript figures; paper reorganized, conclusions modifie

Mechanism of the fluxional behaviour in (1–5-η-cycloheptadienyl)-(1–5-η-cycloheptatrienyl)iron

Evidence for a 1.2-shift mechanism of the 1-5-η-cycloheptatrienyl moiety with respect to the central iron atom of the title compound is presented together with absolute assignments of the ^(13)C n.m.r. chemical shifts of the C_(7)H_(7) ring. A low-temperature rocking motion of both rings can be frozen out at -70 °C

Quantum Fluctuation-Induced Phase Transition in S=1/2 XY-like Heisenberg Antiferromagnets on the Triangular Lattice

The selection of the ground state among nearly degenerate states due to quantum fluctuations is studied for the S=1/2 XY-like Heisenberg antiferromagnets on the triangular lattice in the magnetic field applied along the hard axis, which was first pointed out by Nikuni and Shiba. We find that the selected ground state sensitively depends on the degree of the anisotropy and the magnitude of the magnetic field. This dependence is similar to that in the corresponding classical model at finite temperatures where various types of field induced phases appear due to the entropy effect. It is also found that the similarity of the selected states in the classical and quantum models are not the case in a two-leg ladder lattice, although the lattice consists of triangles locally and the ground state of this lattice in the classical case is the same as that of the triangular lattice.Comment: 15 pages, 35 figure

Nonexponential Relaxation of Magnetization at the Resonant Tunneling Point under a Fluctuating Random Noise

Nonexponential relaxation of magnetization at resonant tunneling points of nanoscale molecular magnets is interpreted to be an effect of fluctuating random field around the applied field. We demonstrate such relaxation in Langevin equation analysis and clarify how the initial relaxation (square-root time) changes to the exponential decay. The scaling properties of the relaxation are also discussed.Comment: 4 pages, 4 fgiure

Low-Lying Excited States of Quantum Antiferromagnets on a Triangular Lattice

We study low-lying states of the XY and Heisenberg antiferromagnets on a triangular lattice to clarify whether spontaneous symmetry breaking occurs at $T=0$ in the thermodynamic limit. Approximate forms of low-lying states are proposed, in which degrees of freedom of the sublattice magnetization and of the chirality are separated. It is shown that low-lying states can be accurately described with the present approximation. It was argued that low-lying states play an important role in symmetry breaking. With help of this approximation, we discuss the contribution of low-lying states to symmetry breaking of two types, namely creation of the spontaneous sublattice magnetization and the spontaneous chirality. Furthermore, to show an evidence for the occurrence of the symmetry breaking, we numerically study the low-lying states of finite systems of the XY and Heisenberg antiferromagnets. It is found that the necessary conditions for the symmetry breaking to occur are satisfied in these models.Comment: LaTex 22 pages, figures included in uuencoded form, to be published in J.Stat.Phy

Magnetization Process of the S=1 and 1/2 Uniform and Distorted Kagome Heisenberg Antiferromagnets

The magnetization process of the S=1 and 1/2 kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet is studied by means of the numerical exact diagonalization method. It is found that the magnetization curve at zero temperature has a plateau at 1/3 of the full magnetization. In the presence of $\sqrt{3} \times \sqrt{3}$ lattice distortion, this plateau is enhanced and eventually the ferrimagnetic state is realized. There also appear the minor plateaux above the main plateau. The physical origin of these phenomena is discussed.Comment: 5 pages, 10 figures included, to be published in J. Phys. Soc. Jp

Magnetization Process of Nanoscale Iron Cluster

Low-temperature magnetization process of the nanoscale iron cluster in linearly sweeped fields is investigated by a numerical analysis of time-dependent Schr$\ddot{\rm o}$dinger equation and the quantum master equation. We introduce an effective basis method extracting important states, by which we can obtain the magnetization process effectively. We investigate the structure of the field derivative of the magnetization. We find out that the antisymmetric interaction determined from the lattice structure reproduces well the experimental results of the iron magnets and that this interaction plays an important role in the iron cluster. Deviations from the adiabatic process are also studied. In the fast sweeping case, our calculations indicate that the nonadiabatic transition dominantly occurs at the level crossing for the lowest field. In slow sweeping case, due to the influence of the thermal environment to the spin system, the field derivative of the magnetization shows an asymmetric behavior, the magnetic F$\ddot{\rm o}$hn effect, which explains the substructure of the experimental results in the pulsed field.Comment: 5 pages of text and 2 pages of 6 figures. To appear in J. Phys. Soc. Jp