Electric field induced thermal Hall effect of triplons in the quantum dimer magnets $X$CuCl$_{3}$ ($X =$ Tl, K)

Abstract

We propose the electric field induced thermal Hall effect of triplons in the quantum dimer magnets $X$CuCl$_{3}$ ($X =$ Tl, K), which exhibit spin-driven ferroelectricity in the Bose-Einstein condensation phase of triplons. The interplay between ferroelectricity and magnetism in these materials leads to the magnetoelectric effect, i.e., an electric-field induced Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM) interaction between spins belonging to the same dimer. We argue that this intra-dimer DM interaction breaks the symmetry of the system in the absence of an electric field and gives rise to the thermal Hall effect, which can be detected in experimentally accessible electric and magnetic fields. We also show that the thermal Hall effect can be controlled by changing the strength or direction of the electric field.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figure