Kitaev materials

In transition-metal compounds with partially filled 4d and 5d shells spin–orbit entanglement, electronic correlations, and crystal-field effects conspire to give rise to a variety of novel forms of topological quantum matter. This includes Kitaev materials — a family of spin–orbit assisted Mott insulators, in which local, spin–orbit entangled j=1/2 moments form that are subject to dominant bond-directional Ising exchange interactions. On a conceptual level, Kitaev materials attract much interest for their potential for unconventional forms of magnetism, such as spin liquid physics in two- and three-dimensional lattice geometries or the formation of non-trivial spin textures. Experimentally, a number of Kitaev…

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