Ground state and excitation of an asymmetric spin ladder model

Abstract

We perform a systematic investigation of an asymmetric zig-zag spin ladder with inter-leg exchange $J_1$ and different exchange integrals $J_2 \pm \delta$ on both legs. In the weak limit of frustration, the spin model can be mapped to a revised double frequency Sine-Gorden model by using bosonization. Renormalization group analysis shows that the Heisenberg critical point flows to an intermediate-coupling fixed point with gapless excitations and a vanishing spin velocity. When the frustration is large, a spin gap opens and a dimer liquid is realized. Fixing $J_2 = J_1 /2$, we find, as a function of $\delta$, a continuous manifold of Hamiltonians with dimer product ground states, interpolating between the Majumdar-Ghosh and sawtooth spin-chain model. While the ground state is independent of the alternating next-nearest-neighbor exchange $\delta$, the gap size of excitations is found to decrease with increasing $\delta$. We also extend our study to a two-dimensional double layer model with an exactly known ground state.