Continuous degeneracy of the fcc kagome lattice with magnetic dipolar interactions

TL;DR

This paper investigates the complex spin states and degeneracy in a 3D fcc kagome lattice with dipolar interactions, revealing continuous degeneracy, its reduction by thermal fluctuations and magnetic fields, and evidence of a phase transition.

Contribution

It extends previous 2D kagome work to 3D, showing continuous degeneracy and its lifting mechanisms, with detailed computational analysis of phase behavior.

Findings

3D fcc kagome lattice exhibits continuous degeneracy of spin states.

Thermal fluctuations induce order-by-disorder, reducing degeneracy at low temperatures.

A phase transition occurs at approximately T ≈ 0.38 in dipole units.

Abstract

Results are presented on analytic and computational analyses of the spin states associated with a 3D fcc lattice composed of ABC stacked kagome planes of magnetic ions with only long-range dipole-dipole interactions. Extending previous work on the 2D kagome system, where discrete six-fold discrete degeneracy of the ground state was revealed [Holden et al. Phys. Rev. B 91, 224425 (2015)], we show that the 3D lattice exhibits a continuous degeneracy characterized by just two spherical angles involving six sublattice spin vectors. Application of a Heat Bath Monte Carlo algorithm shows that thermal fluctuations reduce this degeneracy at very low temperature in an order-by-disorder process. A magnetic field applied along directions of high symmetry also results in lifting the continuous degeneracy to a subset of states from the original set of ground states. Metropolis Monte Carlo simulation results are also presented on the temperature and system size dependence of the energy, specific heat, and magnetization, providing evidence for a phase transition at T $\simeq$ 0.38 (in units of the dipole strength). The results can be relevant to a class of magnetic compounds having the AuCu$_3$ crystal structure.