Signatures of the finite-temperature mirror symmetry breaking in the $S$=1/2 Shastry-Sutherland model

TL;DR

This paper explores how mirror symmetry breaking manifests at finite temperatures in the $S$=1/2 Shastry-Sutherland model, revealing phase transition signatures and symmetry recovery phenomena linked to experimental observations.

Contribution

It introduces a quantum typicality approach to detect finite-temperature phase transitions and symmetry behaviors in the Shastry-Sutherland model, connecting theoretical predictions with experiments.

Findings

Signatures of phase transition detected at moderate temperatures.

Mirror symmetry shows recovery at very low temperatures in finite systems.

Predicted disappearance of recovery and saturation in the thermodynamic limit.

Abstract

We investigate the finite-temperature properties of the $S$=1/2 Shastry-Sutherland Heisenberg model using a quantum typicality method. In the intermediate plaquette state region, we naturally expect to realize the finite-temperature phase transition associated with breaking the mirror symmetry of this model. We reveal some signatures of the spontaneous phase transition within a two-point correlation level at moderate temperatures since the constructed typical state can sense the existence of the degenerated excited states depending on the initial random state. We also confirm that the local mirror order parameter shows the intriguing recovering phenomenon of the mirror symmetry in very low-temperatures, which could be understood from the nature of the ground and excited states of the finite-size systems. We expect that this recovering feature disappears; instead, a saturated behavior appears in the local mirror order parameter in the thermodynamic limit. We discuss the relationship to the recent experimental results on ${\rm SrCu_2(BO_3)_2}$ under high pressures.