arXiv · 2512.24269
Orbital magnetic octupole in crystalline solids and characterization of orbital altermagnetism
Abstract
Magnetic multipole moments beyond dipoles have emerged as key descriptors of unconventional electromagnetic responses in crystalline solids. However, a gauge-invariant bulk expression for orbital magnetic multipole moments has remained elusive, hindering a unified understanding of their physical consequences. Here we formulate a gauge-invariant expression for the orbital magnetic octupole moment in periodic crystals and investigate its behavior in two models with distinct origins of magnetism: a spinless two-orbital model with orbital magnetic order arising from complex hopping and a two-sublattice $d$-wave altermagnetic model based on antiferromagnetic spin order. We also show that the orbital magnetic octupole is naturally linked to a higher-rank Hall response induced by spatially nonuniform electric fields, leading to a generalized St\v{r}eda-type relation. Our results further demonstrate that the orbital magnetic octupole provides a quantitative characterization of \textsl{orbital altermagnetism}.
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Takumi Sato, Satoru Hayami. 2025-12-30. Orbital magnetic octupole in crystalline solids and characterization of orbital altermagnetism. https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.24269
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