Identification of ground-state spin ordering in antiferromagnetic transition metal oxides using the Ising model and a genetic algorithm

Abstract

We identify ground-state collinear spin ordering in various antiferromagnetic transition metal oxides by constructing the Ising model from first-principles results and applying a genetic algorithm to find its minimum energy state. The present method can correctly reproduce the ground state of well-known antiferromagnetic oxides such as NiO, Fe2O3, Cr2O3 and MnO2. Furthermore, we identify the ground-state spin ordering in more complicated materials such as Mn3O4 and CoCr2O4.