Abstract
We have studied the effect of nonmagnetic Zn impurities in the coupled spin ladder using NMR, muon spin resonance (), and quantum Monte Carlo simulations. Our results show that the impurities induce in their vicinity antiferromagnetic polarizations, extending over a few unit cells. At low temperature, these extended moments freeze in a process which is found universal among various other spin-gapped compounds: isolated ladders, Haldane, or spin-Peierls chains. This allows us to propose a simple common framework to explain the generic low-temperature impurity-induced freezings observed in low-dimensional spin-gapped materials.
- Received 6 March 2009
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.103.047201
©2009 American Physical Society