Spirit inputfile

The following sections will list and explain the input file keywords.

  1. General Settings and Log
  2. Geometry
  3. Heisenberg Hamiltonian
  4. Gaussian Hamiltonian
  5. Method Output
  6. Method Parameters
  7. Pinning
  8. Disorder and Defects

General Settings and Log

### Add a tag to output files (for timestamp use "<time>")
output_file_tag         some_tag
### Save input parameters on creation of State
log_input_save_initial  0
### Save input parameters on deletion of State
log_input_save_final    0

### Print log messages to the console
log_to_console    1
### Print messages up to (including) log_console_level
log_console_level 5

### Save the log as a file
log_to_file    1
### Save messages up to (including) log_file_level
log_file_level 5

Except for SEVERE and ERROR, only log messages up to log_console_level will be printed and only messages up to log_file_level will be saved. If log_to_file, however is set to zero, no file is written at all.

Log Levels Integer Description
ALL 0 Everything
SEVERE 1 Only severe errors
ERROR 2 Also non-fatal errors
WARNING 3 Also warnings
PARAMETER 4 Also input parameters
INFO 5 Also info-messages
DEBUG 6 Also deeper debug-info

Geometry

The Geometry of a spin system is specified in form of a bravais lattice and a basis cell of atoms. The number of basis cells along each principal direction of the basis can be specified. Note: the default basis is a single atom at (0,0,0).

3D simple cubic example:

### The bravais lattice type
bravais_lattice sc

### µSpin
mu_s 2.0

### Number of basis cells along principal
### directions (a b c)
n_basis_cells 100 100 10

If you have a nontrivial basis cell, note that you should specify mu_s for all atoms in your basis cell (see the next example).

2D honeycomb example:

### The bravais lattice type
bravais_lattice hex2d

### The basis cell in units of bravais vectors
### n            No of spins in the basis cell
### 1.x 1.y 1.z  position of spins within basis
### 2.x 2.y 2.z  cell in terms of bravais vectors
basis
2
0          0         0
0.33333333 0.3333333 0

### µSpin
mu_s 2.0 1.0

### Number of basis cells along principal
### directions (a b c)
n_basis_cells 100 100 1

The bravais lattice can be one of the following:

Bravais Lattice Type Keyword Comment
Simple cubic sc
Body-centered cubic bcc
Face-centered cubic fcc
Hexagonal (2D) hex2d 60deg angle
Hexagonal (2D) hex2d60 60deg angle
Hexagonal (2D) hex2d120 120deg angle
Hexagonal closely packed hcp 120deg, not yet implemented
Hexagonal densely packed hdp 60deg, not yet implemented
Rhombohedral rho not yet implemented
Simple-tetragonal stet not yet implemented
Simple-orthorhombic so not yet implemented
Simple-monoclinic sm not yet implemented
Simple triclinic stri not yet implemented

Alternatively it can be input manually, either through vectors or as the bravais matrix:

### bravais_vectors or bravais_matrix
###   a.x a.y a.z       a.x b.x c.x
###   b.x b.y b.z       a.y b.y c.y
###   c.x c.y c.z       a.z b.z c.z
bravais_vectors
1.0 0.0 0.0
0.0 1.0 0.0
0.0 0.0 1.0

A lattice constant can be used for scaling:

### Scaling constant
lattice_constant 1.0

Note that it scales the Bravais vectors and therefore the translations, atom positions in the basis cell and potentially – if you specified them in terms of the Bravais vectors – also the anisotropy and DM vectors.

Units:

The Bravais vectors (or matrix) are specified in Cartesian coordinates in units of Angstrom. The basis atoms are specified in units of the Bravais vectors.

The atomic moments mu_s are specified in units of the Bohr magneton mu_B.

Heisenberg Hamiltonian

To use a Heisenberg Hamiltonian, use either heisenberg_neighbours or heisenberg_pairs as input parameter after the hamiltonian keyword.

The Hamiltonian is defined as

https://math.now.sh?from=%0A%09%5Cmathcal%7BH%7D%20%3D%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20-%20%5Csum_i%20%5Cmu_i%20%5Cvec%7BB%7D%5Ccdot%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20-%20%5Csum_i%20%5Csum_j%20K_j%20%28%5Chat%7BK%7D_j%5Ccdot%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%29%5E2%5C%5C%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20-%20%5Csum%5Climits_%7B%5Cbraket%7Bij%7D%7D%5C%2C%20J_%7Bij%7D%20%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%5Ccdot%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_j%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20-%20%5Csum%5Climits_%7B%5Cbraket%7Bij%7D%7D%5C%2C%20%5Cvec%7BD%7D_%7Bij%7D%20%5Ccdot%20(%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%5Ctimes%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_j)%5C%5C%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%2B%20%5Cfrac%7B1%7D%7B2%7D%5Cfrac%7B%5Cmu_0%7D%7B4%5Cpi%7D%20%5Csum_%7B%5Csubstack%7Bi%2Cj%20%5C%5C%20i%20%5Cneq%20j%7D%7D%20%5Cmu_i%20%5Cmu_j%20%5Cfrac%7B(%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%20%5Ccdot%20%5Chat%7Br%7D_%7Bij%7D)%20(%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_j%5Ccdot%5Chat%7Br%7D_%7Bij%7D)%20-%20%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%20%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_j%7D%7B%7Br_%7Bij%7D%7D%5E3%7D

where <ij> denotes the unique pairs of interacting spins i and j. For more details, such as the notation used here, see Phys. Rev. B 99 224414 (2019).

General Parameters:

### Hamiltonian Type (heisenberg_neighbours, heisenberg_pairs, gaussian)
hamiltonian              heisenberg_neighbours

### Boundary conditions (in a b c) = 0(open), 1(periodical)
boundary_conditions      1 1 0

### External magnetic field [T]
external_field_magnitude 25.0
external_field_normal    0.0 0.0 1.0

### Uniaxial anisotropy constant [meV]
anisotropy_magnitude     0.0
anisotropy_normal        0.0 0.0 1.0

### Dipole-dipole interaction caclulation method
### (none, fft, fmm, cutoff)
ddi_method               fft

### DDI number of periodic images (fft and fmm) in (a b c)
ddi_n_periodic_images    4 4 4

### DDI cutoff radius (if cutoff is used)
ddi_radius               0.0

ddi_pb_zero_padding      1.0

Anisotropy: By specifying a number of anisotropy axes via n_anisotropy, one or more anisotropy axes can be set for the atoms in the basis cell. Specify columns via headers: an index i and an axis Kx Ky Kz or Ka Kb Kc, as well as optionally a magnitude K.

Dipole-Dipole Interaction: Via the keyword ddi_method the method employed to calculate the dipole-dipole interactions is specified.

  `none`   -  Dipole-Dipole interactions are neglected
  `fft`    -  Uses a fast convolution method to accelerate the calculation (RECOMMENDED)
  `cutoff` -  Lets only spins within a maximal distance of 'ddi_radius' interact
  `fmm`    -  Uses the Fast-Multipole-Method (NOT YET IMPLEMENTED!)

If the cutoff-method has been chosen the cutoff-radius can be specified via ddi_radius. Note: If ddi_radius < 0 a direct summation (i.e. brute force) over the whole system is performed. This is very inefficient and only encouraged for very small systems and/or unit-testing/debugging.

If the boundary conditions are periodic ddi_n_periodic_images specifies how many images are taken in the respective direction. Note: The images are appended on both sides (the edges get filled too) i.e. 1 0 0 -> one image in +a direction and one image in -a direction

If the boundary conditions are open in a lattice direction and sufficiently many periodic images are chosen, zero-padding in that direction can be skipped. This improves the speed and memory footprint of the calculation, but comes at the cost of a very slight asymmetry in the interactions (decreasing with increasing periodic images). If ddi_pb_zero_padding is set to 1, zero-padding is performed - even if the boundary condition is periodic in a direction. If it is set to 0, zero-padding is skipped.

Neighbour shells:

Using hamiltonian heisenberg_neighbours, pair-wise interactions are handled in terms of (isotropic) neighbour shells:

### Hamiltonian Type (heisenberg_neighbours, heisenberg_pairs, gaussian)
hamiltonian       heisenberg_neighbours

### Exchange: number of shells and constants [meV / unique pair]
n_shells_exchange 2
jij               10.0  1.0

### Chirality of DM vectors (+/-1=bloch, +/-2=neel)
dm_chirality      2
### DMI: number of shells and constants [meV / unique pair]
n_shells_dmi      2
dij	              6.0 0.5

Note that pair-wise interaction parameters always mean energy per unique pair <ij> (i.e. not per neighbour).

Specify Pairs:

Using hamiltonian heisenberg_pairs, you may input interactions explicitly, in form of unique pairs <ij>, giving you more granular control over the system and the ability to specify non-isotropic interactions:

### Hamiltonian Type (heisenberg_neighbours, heisenberg_pairs, gaussian)
hamiltonian       heisenberg_pairs

### Pairs
n_interaction_pairs 3
i j   da db dc    Jij   Dij  Dijx Dijy Dijz
0 0    1  0  0   10.0   6.0   1.0  0.0  0.0
0 0    0  1  0   10.0   6.0   0.0  1.0  0.0
0 0    0  0  1   10.0   6.0   0.0  0.0  1.0

### Quadruplets
n_interaction_quadruplets 1
i    j  da_j  db_j  dc_j    k  da_k  db_k  dc_k    l  da_l  db_l  dc_l    Q
0    0  1     0     0       0  0     1     0       0  0     0     1       3.0

Note that pair-wise interaction parameters always mean energy per unique pair <ij> (not per neighbour).

Pairs: Leaving out either exchange or DMI in the pairs is allowed and columns can be placed in arbitrary order. Note that instead of specifying the DM-vector as Dijx Dijy Dijz, you may specify it as Dija Dijb Dijc if you prefer. You may also specify the magnitude separately as a column Dij, but note that if you do, the vector (e.g. Dijx Dijy Dijz) will be normalized.

Quadruplets: Columns for these may also be placed in arbitrary order.

Separate files: The anisotropy, pairs and quadruplets can be placed into separate files, you can use anisotropy_from_file, pairs_from_file and quadruplets_from_file.

If the headers for anisotropies, pairs or quadruplets are at the top of the respective file, it is not necessary to specify n_anisotropy, n_interaction_pairs or n_interaction_quadruplets respectively.

### Pairs
interaction_pairs_file       input/pairs.txt

### Quadruplets
interaction_quadruplets_file input/quadruplets.txt

Note that the quadruplet interaction is defined as

https://math.now.sh?from=E_%5Cmathrm%7BQuad%7D%20%3D%20-%20%5Csum%5Climits_%7Bijkl%7D%5C%2C%20K_%7Bijkl%7D%20%5Cleft%28%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_i%5Ccdot%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_j%5Cright%29%5Cleft(%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_k%5Ccdot%5Cvec%7Bn%7D_l%5Cright)

Units:

The external field is specified in Tesla, while anisotropy is specified in meV. Pairwise interactions are specified in meV per unique pair <ij>, while quadruplets are specified in meV per unique quadruplet <ijkl>.

Gaussian Hamiltonian

Note that you select the Hamiltonian you use with the hamiltonian gaussian input option.

This is a testing Hamiltonian consisting of the superposition of gaussian potentials. It does not contain interactions.

hamiltonian gaussian

### Number of Gaussians
n_gaussians 2

### Gaussians
###   a is the amplitude, s is the width, c the center
###   the directions c you enter will be normalized
###   a1 s1 c1.x c1.y c1.z
###   ...
gaussians
 1    0.2   -1   0   0
 0.5  0.4    0   0  -1

Method Output

For llg and equivalently mc and gneb, you can specify which output you want your simulations to create. They share a few common output types, for example:

llg_output_any     1    # Write any output at all
llg_output_initial 1    # Save before the first iteration
llg_output_final   1    # Save after the last iteration

Note in the following that step means after each N iterations and denotes a separate file for each step, whereas archive denotes that results are appended to an archive file at each step.

The energy output files are in units of meV, and can be switched to meV per spin with <method>_output_energy_divide_by_nspins.

LLG:

llg_output_energy_step             0    # Save system energy at each step
llg_output_energy_archive          1    # Archive system energy at each step
llg_output_energy_spin_resolved    0    # Also save energies for each spin
llg_output_energy_divide_by_nspins 1    # Normalize energies with number of spins

llg_output_configuration_step      1    # Save spin configuration at each step
llg_output_configuration_archive   0    # Archive spin configuration at each step

MC:

mc_output_energy_step             0
mc_output_energy_archive          1
mc_output_energy_spin_resolved    0
mc_output_energy_divide_by_nspins 1

mc_output_configuration_step    1
mc_output_configuration_archive 0

GNEB:

gneb_output_energies_step             0 # Save energies of images in chain
gneb_output_energies_interpolated     1 # Also save interpolated energies
gneb_output_energies_divide_by_nspins 1 # Normalize energies with number of spins

gneb_output_chain_step 0    # Save the whole chain at each step

Method Parameters

Again, the different Methods share a few common parameters. On the example of the LLG Method:

### Maximum wall time for single simulation
### hh:mm:ss, where 0:0:0 is infinity
llg_max_walltime        0:0:0

### Force convergence parameter
llg_force_convergence   10e-9

### Number of iterations
llg_n_iterations        2000000
### Number of iterations after which to save
llg_n_iterations_log    2000

LLG:

### Seed for Random Number Generator
llg_seed            20006

### Damping [none]
llg_damping         0.3E+0

### Time step dt [ps]
llg_dt              1.0E-3

### Temperature [K]
llg_temperature	    0
llg_temperature_gradient_direction   1 0 0
llg_temperature_gradient_inclination 0.0

### Spin transfer torque parameter proportional to injected current density
llg_stt_magnitude   0.0
### Spin current polarisation normal vector
llg_stt_polarisation_normal	1.0 0.0 0.0

The time step dt is given in picoseconds. The temperature is given in Kelvin and the temperature gradient in Kelvin/Angstrom.

MC:

### Seed for Random Number Generator
mc_seed	            20006

### Temperature [K]
mc_temperature      0

### Acceptance ratio
mc_acceptance_ratio 0.5

GNEB:

### Constant for the spring force
gneb_spring_constant 1.0

### Number of energy interpolations between images
gneb_n_energy_interpolations 10

Pinning

Note that for this feature you need to build with SPIRIT_ENABLE_PINNING set to ON in cmake.

For each lattice direction a b and c, you have two choices for pinning. For example to pin n cells in the a direction, you can set both pin_na_left and pin_na_right to different values or set pin_na to set both to the same value. To set the direction of the pinned cells, you need to give the pinning_cell keyword and one vector for each basis atom.

You can for example do the following to create a U-shaped pinning in x-direction:

# Pin left side of the sample (2 rows)
pin_na_left 2
# Pin top and bottom sides (2 rows each)
pin_nb      2
# Pin the atoms to x-direction
pinning_cell
1 0 0

To specify individual pinned sites (overriding the above pinning settings), insert a list into your input. For example:

### Specify the number of pinned sites and then the sites (in terms of translations) and directions
### i  da db dc  Sx Sy Sz
n_pinned 3
0  0 0 0  1.0 0.0 0.0
0  1 0 0  0.0 1.0 0.0
0  0 1 0  0.0 0.0 1.0

You may also place it into a separate file with the keyword pinned_from_file, e.g.

### Read pinned sites from a separate file
pinned_from_file input/pinned.txt

The file should either contain only the pinned sites or you need to specify n_pinned inside the file.

Disorder and Defects

Note that for this feature you need to build with SPIRIT_ENABLE_DEFECTS set to ON in cmake.

In order to specify disorder across the lattice, you can write for example a single atom basis with 50% chance of containing one of two atom types (0 or 1):

# iatom  atom_type  mu_s  concentration
atom_types 1
    0        1       2.0     0.5

Note that you have to also specify the magnetic moment, as this is now site- and atom type dependent.

A two-atom basis where

  • the first atom is type 0
  • the second atom is 70% type 1 and 30% type 2
# iatom  atom_type  mu_s  concentration
atom_types 2
    0        0       1.0      1
    1        1       2.5     0.7
    1        2       2.3     0.3

The total concentration on a site should not be more than 1. If it is less than 1, vacancies will appear.

To specify defects, be it vacancies or impurities, you may fix atom types for sites of the whole lattice by inserting a list into your input. For example:

### Atom types: type index 0..n or or vacancy (type < 0)
### Specify the number of defects and then the defects in terms of translations and type
### i  da db dc  itype
n_defects 3
0  0 0 0  -1
0  1 0 0  -1
0  0 1 0  -1

You may also place it into a separate file with the keyword defects_from_file, e.g.

### Read defects from a separate file
defects_from_file input/defects.txt

The file should either contain only the defects or you need to specify n_defects inside the file.


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