Spin-Glass Transition in Bond-Disordered Heisenberg Antiferromagnets Coupled with Local Lattice Distortions on a Pyrochlore Lattice

Abstract

Motivated by puzzling characteristics of spin-glass transitions widely observed in pyrochlore-based frustrated materials, we investigate the effects of coupling to local lattice distortions in a bond-disordered antiferromagnet on the pyrochlore lattice by extensive Monte Carlo simulations. We show that the spin-glass transition temperature T(f) is largely enhanced by the spin-lattice coupling and, furthermore, becomes almost independent of Δ in a wide range of the disorder strength Δ. The critical property of the spin-glass transition is indistinguishable from that of the canonical Heisenberg spin glass in the entire range of Δ. These peculiar behaviors are ascribed to a modification of the degenerate manifold from a continuous to semidiscrete one by spin-lattice coupling.