Modulated phases and the mean-field theory of magnetism with competing interactions

Abstract

The mean-field theory of an Ising magnet with infinitely weak, infinitely long-range potentials of arbitrary sign is presented in terms of a variational principle for the magnetization. Previous studies of the theory have revealed paramagnetic, ferromagnetic, and modulated phases. For a particular choice of potential, which is an obvious continuous version of the between-plane ANNNI model interaction, exact solutions of the stationary condition implied by the variational principle are obtained. This leads us to formulate a trial magnetization to well describe the modulated phase in general. To illustrate the utility of the trial magnetization, both analytic and numerical calculations are per..