Motivated by the global phase diagram of antiferromagnetic heavy-fermion metals, we study the Kondo effect from the perspective of a nonlinear sigma model in the one-dimensional Kondo-Heisenberg model away from half-filling. We focus on the effects of the instanton configurations of the sigma-model field and the associated Berry phase. Guided by the results derived using bosonization methods, we demonstrate that the Kondo-singlet formation is accompanied by an emergent Berry phase. This Berry phase also captures the competition between the Kondo-singlet formation and spin-Peierls correlations. Related effects are likely to be realized in Kondo lattice systems in higher dimensions.

• Received 3 June 2011

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.126404