Flux $1/f^{\alpha}$ noise in 2D Heisenberg spin glasses: effects of weak anisotropic interactions

Abstract

We study the dynamics of a two-dimensional ensemble of randomly distributed classical Heisenberg spins with isotropic RKKY and weaker anisotropic dipole-dipole couplings. Such ensembles may give rise to the flux noise observed in SQUIDs with a $1/f^{\alpha}$ power spectrum ($\alpha \lesssim 1$). We solve numerically the Landau-Lifshiftz-Gilbert equations of motion in the dissipationless limit. We find that Ising type fluctuators, which arise from spin clustering close to a spin-glass critical behavior with $T_c =0$, give rise to $1/f^{\alpha}$ noise. Even weak anisotropic interactions lead to a crossover from the Heisenberg-type criticality to the much stronger Ising-type criticality. The temperature dependent exponent $\alpha(T) \lesssim 1$ grows and approaches unity when the temperature is lowered. This mechanism acts in parallel to the spin diffusion mechanism. Whereas the latter is sensitive to the device geometry, the spin-clustering mechanism is largely geometry independent.