Naturally Tuned Quantum Critical Point in the S = 1 Kagome YCa3(VO)3(BO3)4

Published

April 26, 2018

Author(s)

Harlyn J. Silverstein, Ryan Sinclair, Arzoo Sharma, Yiming Qiu, Ivo Heinmaa, Alexander Leitmae, Christopher R. Wiebe, R. Stern, Haidong Zhou

Abstract

Although S = 1/2 kagome systems have been intensely studied theoretically, and within the last decade been realized experimentally, much less is known about the S = 1 analogues. While the theoretical ground state is still under debate, it has been found experimentally that S = 1 kagome systems either order at low temperatures or enter a spin glass state. In this letter, YCa6d3^(VO)₃(BO₃)₄ (YCVBO) is presented, with trivalent vanadium. Owing to its unusual crystal structure, the metal-metal bonding is highly connected along all three crystallographic directions, atypical of other kagome materials. Using neutron scattering it is shown that YCVBO fails to order down to at least 50 mK and exhibits a broad, dispersionless, and gapped excitation at 0.71(2) meV. ¹¹B NMR provides evidence of fluctuating spins at low temperature while DC-magnetization shows critical scaling that is also observed in systems near a quantum critical points such as Herbertsmithite, despite its insulating nature and S = 1 magnetism. The evidence shown indicates that YCVBO is naturally tuned to be a quantum disordered magnet in the limit of T = 0 k.

Citation

Physical Review Materials

Volume

2

Issue

4

Pub Type

Journals

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Keywords

quantum critical point, kagome lattice

Citation

Silverstein, H. , Sinclair, R. , Sharma, A. , Qiu, Y. , Heinmaa, I. , Leitmae, A. , Wiebe, C. , Stern, R. and Zhou, H. (2018), Naturally Tuned Quantum Critical Point in the S = 1 Kagome YCa₃(VO)₃(BO₃)₄, Physical Review Materials, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=923933 (Accessed October 14, 2025)