Magnetic excitations in coupled Haldane spin chains near the quantum critical point

Abstract

Two quasi-1-dimensional S=1 quantum antiferromagnetic materials, PbNi2V2O8 and SrNi2V2O8, are studied by inelastic neutron scattering on powder samples. While magnetic interactions in the two systems are found to be very similar, subtle differences in inter-chain interaction strengths and magnetic anisotropy are detected. The latter are shown to be responsible for qualitatively different ground state properties: magnetic long-range order in SrNi2V2O8 and disordered ``spin liquid'' Haldane-gap state in PbNi2V2O8.

15 figures, Figs. 5,9, and 10 in color. Some figures in JPEG format. Complete PostScript and PDF available from http://papillon.phy.bnl.gov/publicat.htm