Heat conduction in magnetic insulators via hybridization of acoustic phonons and spin-flip excitations

We present a comprehensive study on the longitudinal magneto-thermal transport in a paramagnetic effective spin-1/2 magnetic insulator CsYbSe${}_2$, by introducing a minimal model requiring only Zeeman splitting and magnetoelastic coupling. We use it to argue that hybridized excitations – formed from acoustic phonons and localized spin-flip-excitations across the Zeeman gap of the crystal electric field ground doublet – are responsible for a non-monotonic field dependence of longitudinal thermal conductivity. Beyond highlighting a starring role for phonons, our results raise the prospect of universal magneto-thermal transport phenomena in paramagnetic insulators that originate from simple features shared across many systems.