Quantum simulation of a frustrated XY antiferromagnet using trapped ions

P. H AUKE , R. S CHMIED, T. R OSCILDE , V. M URG , D. P ORRAS , J. I. C IRAC M AX P LANCK I NSTITUTE OF Q UANTUM O PTICS , G ARCHING , G ERMANY

Motivation
Frustrated quantum magnets may exhibit exotic phases like spin-liquids, long-range chiral order or resonating valence bond phases.

Quantum simulation scheme

Trap: Ions assembled in an electromagnetic trap form a Wigner crystal. Lattice: A strong optical lattice connes each ion to an individual lattice minimum. The vibrational degrees of freedom of the ions can be described by a phonon BoseHubbard Hamiltonian HBH =
,

Theories still do not agree on the phase diagrams.

t,

a a + H.c. + U n (n 1) + V n

Using the quantized motion of ions in the microtraps provided by an optical lattice, we provide a scheme to simulate a frustrated XY Hamiltonian on an anisotropic triangular lattice.
t1 t2 m

Tunneling of phonons t, is due to the dipoledipole component of the Coulomb interaction between ions: t, =
e2 3 80 r,

m m 3 n, m

n, m

It can be tuned by adjusting the direction of vibration m of the ion (via engineering of the optical lattice).

Phononphonon interaction U is induced by the anharmonicity of the optical lattice, tuneable by a sublattice.
+

For very large repulsive U only 0 or 1 phonon may exist at each site.

This effective two-level system can be mapped to spin operators + z a S , a S , n S + 1 (HolsteinPrimakoff transformation) 2
The result is an XY Hamiltonian:
2 U

T. Schatz et al., MPQ 2006

HS = 2

t,

y y x x S S + S S

z V S

1 0 n

t,

Classical simulations
We use exact diagonalization on small lattices, a modied spin-wave theory [2], [3] projected entangled pair states (PEPS) and
to calculate the expected phase diagram of an antiferromagnetic XY Hamiltonian with frustrated nearest-neighbor interaction on an anisotropic triangular lattice (for S = 1/2 spins). modied spin-wave theory (msw):

Results of the msw theory

Long-range order
ordering wave vector (x-component) / 2 1.8 1.6 1.4 1.2 1 0 0.5
modified spin waves classical

transition to boson operators (DysonMaleev): Si 1 2S a ai ai , Si+ 1 a , i 2S 2S i

Si

Ground state energy

2D-Neel
energies of central spin 0 -0.1

S + a ai i

derivation of a mean eld Hamiltonian minimisation of free energy under constraint of Si = 0 (required by rotational symmetry) self-consistent equations advantages avoids 1/S expansion as in conventional
spin-wave methods

-0.2
exact, 4x5 PEPS, D=3, 10x10 modified spin waves

-0.3

1 t2/t1

1.5

1D-Neel

0.5

1 t2/t1

1.5

0.5 order parameter 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0

theoretical maximum

Energies

procedure transformation to a rotated coordinate system:

corresponding to t1 - and t2 -bond

energies of central spin

magnonmagnon interactions are treated

better than with conventional spin-waves

0.1
0.5 1 t2/t1 1.5 2

0 -0.1 -0.2 -0.3 -0.4 0

t1 (mean) exact, 4x5 t2 (mean) exact, 4x5 t1 modified spin waves t2 modified spin waves t1 PEPS, D=3, 10x10 t2 PEPS, D=3, 10x10

Six sin (Q ri ) Si + cos (Q ri ) Si , Siy cos (Q ri ) Si + sin (Q ri ) Si , Siz Si , with Q = (Qx , 0) being the wave vector along
which there is long-range order

easily implemented, but nevertheless repro-

duces results obtained with more sophisticated methods as e.g. PEPS

large order parameter indicates long-range order assumption justied a posteriori

0.5

1 t2/t1

1.5

disadvantages is based on assumption of long range order cannot account for spin-liquid phases

Correlations
Spinspin correlations (PEPS):
t1
7 6 5
x 4 Si, j Six , j

Conclusions
t2
Neel order persists down to values of t2 /t1 as small as 1.4 (classical: t2 /t1 2).

Outlook
Validate the phase diagram experimentally. How does dipolar (experiment) instead of
nearest-neighbor interaction (model) change the phase diagram?

7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Transition from 1D gapless spin-liquid to long-range

chiral order and chiral order to Neel order passes through gapped spin-liquid phases complete loss of long-range correlations instead of continuous deformation of the ordering wave vector (similar to Heisenberg model [4]).

4 3 2 1 0 0 5 10 15

x x 4 Si, j Si, j

Use of a planar array of microfabricated traps would enable to extend this quantum simulation scheme to arbitrary geometries, e.g. the Kagome lattice.

10 distance

15

Chiral correlation: ( ) ( ) , 2 = 33 (Si S j + S j Sk + Sk Si )z

mean chiral correlation / (4/9)
classical 4x4 exact (1) 4x4 exact (2) 4x4 exact PBC 10x10 D=2 (1) 10x10 D=2 (2) 10x10 D=3 (1) 10x10 D=3 (2) 20x20 D=2 (1) 20x20 D=2 (2) 64x64 msw

Phase diagram:
j

i l

a) classical

References
[1] [2] R. Schmied, T. Roscilde, V. Murg, D. Porras, and J. I. Cirac. Quantum Phases of Trapped Ions in an Optical Lattice. New J. Phys. 10 045017, 2008. M. Takahashi. Modied spin-wave theory of a square-lattice antiferromagnet. Phys. Rev. B 40 2491, 1989. J. H. Xu, and C. S. Ting. Modied spin-wave theory of low-dimensional quantum spiral magnets. Phys. Rev. B 43 6177, 1991. S. Yunoki and S. Sorella. Two spin liquid phases in the spatially anisotropic triangular Heisenberg model. Phys. Rev. B 74 014408, 2006. H. Kawamura. Classical and Quantum Chiral Order in Frustrated XY Magnets. mat/0202109v1, 2002. arXiv:cond-

0.5

t2 / t1

[3] [4] [5]

b) quantum mechanical
gapped SL
gapless SL

gapped SL

0 0

0.5

1 t2/t1

1.5

~0.4

spiral order Neel order ~0.6 ~1.2 ~1.4 t

/ t1

[6]

T. Hikihara, M. Kaburagi, and H. Kawamura. Chiral order of Spin-1/2 frustrated quantum spin chains. arXiv:cond-mat/0007095v2, 2000.