Arrested Relaxation in a Disorder-Free Coulomb Spin Liquid
Abstract
We investigate Coulomb spin liquids in classical spin-3/2 ice and show that the enlarged on-site Hilbert space gives rise to a qualitatively new class of such phases. Beyond the conventional magnetic monopoles of spin-1/2 ice, the system hosts additional low-energy crystal-field excitations, whose interplay with monopoles significantly modifies both equilibrium and non-equilibrium properties. Following a thermal quench, we find a pronounced dynamical arrest manifested in an exponentially long-lived {athermal} plateau in spin autocorrelations. This constitutes a rare example of dynamical arrest in a short-range interacting, disorder-free system. We demonstrate that the arrested dynamics originate from novel composite excitation structures unique to spin-3/2 ice and from kinetically constrained relaxation pathways that require activated processes. Our results establish higher-spin ice as a fertile platform for realising unconventional Coulomb spin liquids and dynamical arrest without quenched disorder.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2602.23362,
title = {Arrested Relaxation in a Disorder-Free Coulomb Spin Liquid},
author = {Souvik Kundu and Arnab Seth and Sthitadhi Roy and Subhro Bhattacharjee and Roderich Moessner},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.23362},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
8 pages, 9 figures + Supplementary Material (2 pages)