Non-Kramers Freezing and Unfreezing of Tunneling in the Biaxial Spin Model

Abstract

The ground state tunnel splitting for the biaxial spin model in the magnetic field, H = -D S_{x}^2 + E S_{z}^2 - g μ_B S_z H_z, has been investigated using an instanton approach. We find a new type of spin instanton and a new quantum interference phenomenon associated with it: at a certain field, H_2 = 2SE^{1/2}(D+E)^{1/2}/(g μ_B), the dependence of the tunneling splitting on the field switches from oscillations to a monotonic growth. The predictions of the theory can be tested in Fe_8 molecular nanomagnets.

7 pages, minor changes, published in EPL