Metastable states in the random anisotropy model for amorphous ferromagnets

Abstract

The authors present results of Monte Carlo simulation calculations for the random anisotropy model which suggest that, contrary to recent renormalisation group results, the ferromagnetic (asperomagnetic) ground state is always stable in three dimensions. The authors' calculations suggest that the 'spin glass-like' (speromagnetic) states are always of higher energy and therefore metastable and that they are separated by large energy barriers from each other and from the asperomagnetic ground state.