Ground state of the S = 1/2 Heisenberg spin chain with random ferro- and antiferromagnetic couplings

Abstract

We study the Heisenberg $S=1/2$ chain with random ferro- and antiferromagnetic couplings using quantum Monte Carlo simulations at ultra-low temperatures, converging to the ground state. Finite-size scaling of correlation functions and excitation gaps demonstrate an exotic critical state in qualitative agreement with previous strong-disorder renormalization group calculations but with scaling exponents depending on the coupling distribution. We find dual scaling regimes of the transverse correlations versus the distance, with an $L$ independent form $C(r)=r^{-\mu}$ for $r \ll L$ and $C(r,L)=L^{-\eta}f(r/L)$ for $r/L > 0$, where $\mu > \eta$ and the scaling function is delivered by our analysis. These results are at variance with previous spin-wave and density-matrix renormalization group calculations, thus highlighting the power of unbiased quantum Monte Carlo simulations.