Spiral order in the honeycomb iridate Li_2IrO_3
Abstract
The honeycomb iridates A_2IrO_3 (A = Na, Li) constitute promising candidate materials to realize the Heisenberg-Kitaev model (HKM) in nature, hosting unconventional magnetic as well as spin-liquid phases. Recent experiments suggest, however, that Li_2IrO_3 exhibits a magnetically ordered state of incommensurate spiral type which has not been identified in the HKM. We show that these findings can be understood in the context of an extended Heisenberg-Kitaev scenario satisfying all tentative experimental evidence: (i) the maximum of the magnetic susceptibility is located inside the first Brillouin zone, (ii) the Curie-Weiss temperature is negative relating to dominant antiferromagnetic fluctuations, and (iii) significant second-neighbor spin exchange is involved.
Additional Information
© 2014 American Physical Society. Received 30 April 2014; revised manuscript received 20 August 2014; published 12 September 2014. We thank R. Coldea for insightful comments on the manuscript and acknowledge discussions with R. Valenti, I. Mazin, D. Inosov, G. Khaliullin, P. Gegenwart, S. Manni, E. Andrade, and M. Vojta. J.R. acknowledges support by the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina through Grant No. LPDS 2011-14. R.T. is supported by the ERC starting grant TOPOLECTRICS of the European Research Council (ERC-StG-2013-336012). S.R. is supported by the DFG priority program SPP 1666 "Topological Insulators," DFG FOR 960, and by the Helmholtz association through VI-521.Attached Files
Published - PhysRevB.90.100405.pdf
Submitted - 1404.5818v1.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 45524
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20140506-104013734
- LPDS 2011-14
- Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina
- ERC-StG-2013-336012
- European Research Council ERC starting grant TOPOLECTRIC
- DFG priority program SPP 1666 "Topological Insulators"
- DFG FOR 960
- VI-521
- Helmholtz Association
- Created
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2014-05-06Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-10Created from EPrint's last_modified field