Fractional and composite excitations of antiferromagnetic quantum spin trimer chains

Abstract Using quantum Monte Carlo, exact diagonalization, and perturbation theory, we study the spectrum of the S = 1/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg trimer chain by varying the ratio g = J 2/J 1 of the intertrimer and intratrimer coupling strengths. The doublet ground states of trimers form effective interacting S = 1/2 degrees of freedom described by a Heisenberg chain. Therefore, the conventional two-spinon continuum of width ∝ J 1 when g = 1 evolves into to a similar continuum of width ∝ J 2 when g → 0. The intermediate-energy and high-energy modes are termed doublons and quartons which fractionalize with increasing g to form the conventional spinon continuum. In particular, at g ≈ 0.716, the gap between the low-energy spinon branch and the high-energy band with mixed doublons, quartons, and spinons closes. These features should be observable in inelastic neutron scattering experiments if a quasi-one-dimensional quantum magnet with the linear trimer structure and J 2 < J 1 can be identified. Our results may open a window for exploring the high-energy fractional excitations.