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Microscopic Model Calculations for the Magnetization Process of Layered Triangular-Lattice Quantum Antiferromagnets

Magnetization processes of spin-1/2 layered triangular-lattice antiferromagnets (TLAFs) under a magnetic field H are studied by means of a numerical cluster mean-field method with a scaling scheme. We find that small antiferromagnetic couplings between the layers give rise to several types of extra quantum phase transitions among different high-field coplanar phases. Especially, a field-induced first-order transition is found to occur at H\approx 0.7 H_s, where H_s is the saturation field, as another common quantum effect of ideal TLAFs in addition to the well-established one-third plateau. Our microscopic model calculation with appropriate parameters show excellent agreement with experiments on Ba_3CoSb_2O_9 [T. Susuki et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 267201 (2013)]. Given this fact, we suggest that the Co^{2+}-based compounds may allow for quantum simulations of intriguing properties of this simple frustrated model, such as quantum criticality and supersolid states.