7.

2 Magnetic Order 345

Here, full translational invariance is kept but spin-rotational invariance

is broken; so is time-reversal invariance.
A widespread kind of order is two-sublattice antiferromagnetism. Let
us assume that the lattice is bipartite, i.e., it can be divided into sub-
lattices A and B in such a manner that all the nearest neighbours of an
A-site are on sublattice B , and vice versa. We may think of the square
lattice which can be subdivided in a chessboard-like fashion (Fig. 7.1,
left). This is an example of symmetrical bipartite lattices: it is clear
that the two sublattices play equivalent roles, and have the same num-
ber of lattice sites: IAl = IBI. Notice that the latter feature does not
follow from the bipartite nature: the CuOz lattice (Fig. 3.1) is an exam-
ple for non-symmetrical bipartite lattices (in this particular case, with
[B1/1A[= 2). As we are going to see in our discussion of Lieb’s ferrimag-
netism, asymmetric bipartite lattices favour a special kind of magnetic
order.
/-/-/-/ /- \-t

Figure 7.1: Left: two-sublattice ordering on the square lattice. Right: The non-
collinear three-sublattice ordering pattern of the (non-bipartite) triangular lattice.

Assuming that the magnetic moments are parallel with the z-axis,
the antiferromagnetic order of a symmetrical bipartite lattice can be
described by

The antiferromagnetic order breaks, in addition to the spin-rotational

and the time-reversal invariance, also the (discrete) translational invari-