Abstract
We study both the static and dynamic properties of gapped, one-dimensional, Heisenberg, antiferromagnetic, spin chains at finite temperature through an analysis of the O(3) nonlinear sigma model. Exploiting the integrability of this theory, we are able to compute an exact low-temperature expansion of the finite temperature correlators. We do so using a truncated “form-factor” expansion and so provide evidence that this technique can be successfully extended to finite temperature. As a direct test, we compute the static zero-field susceptibility and obtain an exact match to the susceptibility derived from the low-temperature expansion of the exact free energy. We also study transport properties, computing both the spin conductance and the NMR-relaxation rate, We find these quantities to show ballistic behavior. In particular, the computed spin conductance exhibits a nonzero Drude weight at finite temperature and zero applied field. The physics thus described differs from the spin diffusion reported by Takigawa et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 76, 2173 (1996)] from experiments on the Haldane gap material,
- Received 24 October 2002
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.68.104435
©2003 American Physical Society