Spin-glass dynamics in the presence of a magnetic field: exploration of microscopic properties

The synergy between experiment, theory, and simulations enables a microscopic analysis of spin-glass dynamics in a magnetic field in the vicinity of and below the spin-glass transition temperature Tg. The spin-glass correlation length,ξ(t,tw;T), is analysed both in experiments and in simulations in terms of the waiting time tw after the spin glass has been cooled down to a stabilised measuring temperature T < Tg and of the time t after the magnetic field is changed. This correlation length is extracted experimentally for a CuMn 6 at. % single crystal, as well as for simulations on the Janus II special-purpose supercomputer, the latter with time and length scales comparable to experiment. The non-linear magnetic susceptibility is reported from experiment and simulations, using ξ(t,tw;T) as the scaling variable. Previous experiments are reanalysed, and disagreements about the nature of the Zeeman energy are resolved. The growth of the spin-glass magnetisation in zero-field magnetisation experiments, M_ZFC(t,tw;T), is measured from simulations, verifying the scaling relationships in the dynamical or non-quilibrium regime. Our preliminary search for the de Almeida-Thouless line in D= 3 is discussed.