CondMat for Dummies: Spin symmetry groups

Date

May 29, 2026

Time

5:00 PM - 6:00 PM

Speaker

Jan Priessnitz

Affiliation

MPI-PKS

Language

en

Main Topic

Physik

Other Topics

Physik

Description

In this lecture, I will introduce the theoretical foundation behind altermagnets and unconventional magnetism, the concept of spin symmetries. Spin symmetries are used to describe magnetic systems in the nonrelativistic approximation, contrary to much longer-used magnetic symmetries, which also take relativistic spin-orbit coupling into account, but cannot see the difference between antiferromagnets and altermagnets. In the first half of the talk, I will introduce key aspects of crystal, spin and magnetic symmetries, together with some physical intuition which should make these concepts easier to grasp. I will show how symmetries can be used to classify materials and, most importantly, demonstrate their usefulness in qualitatively determining a wide range of material properties, such as linear-response susceptibilities. In the second half, we will examine several example materials together, try to classify them in terms of spin symmetries and see what kind of physical insight can be obtained from this.

Last modified: May 29, 2026, 7:38:02 AM