Dynamical Signature of Symmetry Fractionalization in Frustrated Magnets

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that dynamical signatures of anyonic excitations and symmetry fractionalization in quantum spin liquids can be detected through spin spectral functions, providing a practical way to identify QSLs experimentally.

Contribution

The study introduces a method to detect symmetry fractionalization in quantum spin liquids via dynamical signatures in spectral functions using quantum Monte Carlo simulations.

Findings

Spectral functions reveal anyonic spinon and vison excitations.

Translational symmetry fractionalization is detectable in spectral data.

Signatures are observable across phase transitions in kagome lattice models.

Abstract

The nontrivialness of quantum spin liquid (QSL) typically manifests in the non-local observables that signifies their existence, however, this fact actually casts shadow on detecting QSL with experimentally accessible probes. Here, we provide a solution by unbiasedly demonstrating dynamical signature of anyonic excitations and symmetry fractionalization in QSL. Employing large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulation and stochastic analytic continuation, we investigate the extended XXZ model on the kagome lattice, and find out that across the phase transitions from Z2 QSLs to different symmetry breaking phases, spin spectral functions can reveal the presence and condensation of emergent anyonic spinon and vison excitations, in particular the translational symmetry fractionalization of the latter, which can be served as the unique dynamical signature of the seemingly ephemeral QSLs in spectroscopic techniques such as inelastic neutron or resonance (inelastic) X-ray scatterings.