Condensed Matter Theory

Abstract:

We study the effect in geometrically frustrated antiferromagnets of weak, random variations in the strength of exchange interactions. Without disorder the simplest classical models for these systems have macroscopically degenerate ground states, and this degeneracy may prevent ordering at any temperature. Weak exchange randomness favours a small subset of these ground states and induces a spin-glass transition at an ordering temperature determined by the amplitude of modulations in interaction strength. We use the replica approach to formulate a theory for this transition, showing that it falls into the same universality class as conventional spin-glass transitions. In addition, we show that a model with a low concentration of defect bonds can be mapped onto a system of randomly located pseudospins that have dipolar effective interactions. We also present detailed results from Monte Carlo simulations of the classical Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the pyrochlore lattice with weak randomness in nearest neighbour exchange.

Abstract:

We demonstrate numerically that non-Abelian quasihole (qh) excitations of the ν=5/2 fractional quantum Hall state have some of the key properties necessary to support quantum computation. We find that as the qh spacing is increased, the unitary transformation which describes winding two qh's around each other converges exponentially to its asymptotic limit and that the two orthogonal wave functions describing a system with four qh's become exponentially degenerate. We calculate the length scales for these two decays to be ξU2.70 and ξE2.30, respectively. Additionally, we determine which fusion channel is lower in energy when two qh's are brought close together. © 2009 The American Physical Society.