Dynamically induced frustration as a route to a quantum spin ice state in Tb2Ti2O7 via virtual crystal field excitations and quantum many-body effects

The Tb2Ti2O7 pyrochlore magnetic material is attracting much attention for its spin liquid state, failing to develop long-range order down to 50 mK despite a Curie-Weiss temperature theta(CW) similar to -14 K. In this Letter we reinvestigate the theoretical description of this material by considering a quantum model of independent tetrahedra to describe its low-temperature properties. The naturally tuned proximity of this system near a Neel to spin ice phase boundary allows for a resurgence of quantum fluctuation effects that lead to an important renormalization of its effective low-energy spin Hamiltonian. As a result, Tb2Ti2O7 is argued to be a quantum spin ice. We put forward an experimental test of this proposal using neutron scattering on a single crystal.