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Updated: Feb 15, 2026

Magnetically Induced Rotating Rayleigh-Taylor Instability
Published on: March 3, 2017
Field-Induced Instability of a Gapless Spin Liquid with a Spinon Fermi Surface
M Gomilšek1, M Klanjšek1, R Žitko1
1Jožef Stefan Institute, Jamova c. 39, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Abstract:
The ground state of the quantum kagome antiferromagnet Zn-brochantite, ZnCu_{3}(OH)_{6}SO_{4}, which is one of only a few known spin-liquid (SL) realizations in two or three dimensions, has been described as a gapless SL with a spinon Fermi surface. Employing nuclear magnetic resonance in a broad magnetic-field range down to millikelvin temperatures, we show that in applied magnetic fields this enigmatic state is intrinsically unstable against a SL with a full or a partial gap. A similar instability of the gapless Fermi-surface SL was previously encountered in an organic triangular-lattice antiferromagnet, suggesting a common destabilization mechanism that most likely arises from spinon pairing. A salient property of this instability is that an infinitesimal field suffices to induce it, as predicted theoretically for some other types of gapless SLs.
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