Fermionic description of spin-gap states of antiferromagnetic Heisenberg ladders in a magnetic field

TL;DR

This paper uses a fermionic approach via Jordan-Wigner transformation and mean-field theory to describe spin-gap states and magnetization plateaux in antiferromagnetic Heisenberg ladders under magnetic fields.

Contribution

It introduces a novel fermionic description of spin-gap states in Heisenberg ladders, clarifying the emergence of magnetization plateaux based on the number of ladder legs.

Findings

Semiquantitative agreement with known spin-gap behaviors

Identification of magnetization plateaux as a function of ladder legs

Fermionic description offers new insights into ladder magnetic states

Abstract

Employing the Jordan-Wigner transformation on a unique path and then making a mean-field treatment of the fermionic Hamiltonian, we semiquantitatively describe the spin-gap states of Heisenberg ladders in a field. The appearance of magnetization plateaux is clarified as a function of the number of legs.