Dynamics of the magnetic susceptibility deep in the Coulomb phase of the dipolar spin ice material Ho2Ti2O7

Abstract

Very recently, it has been recognized that excitations out of the ground state of materials known as spin ice can be viewed as magnetic monopoles, the magnetic analog to electric charges. Like electrons and positrons, these particles possess a charge of +Q or -Q and therefore attract or repel each other. Magnetic monopoles, however, can be accelerated using a magnetic field instead of an electric field. In this talk, I will report on experiments deep into the frozen state of the spin ice material holmium titanate where monopoles are few and far between and the material responds very slowly to a changing magnetic field. Taking advantage of the extremely sensitive magnetic field detector known as a superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID), we measure the rate at which the monopoles are created, move about and are eventually annihilated. A surprisingly simple law emerges at low temperatures, known as an Arrhenius law, suggesting that the generation of these magnetic charges requires an energy that does not change in temperature and for a yet unknown reason, is precisely 3 times the energy required to make a single, bare monopole.