Spontaneous plaquette formation in the SU(4) Spin-Orbital ladder

The low-energy properties of the SU(4) spin-orbital model on a two-leg ladder are studied by a variety of analytical and numerical techniques. Like in the case of SU(2) models, there is a singlet-multiplet gap in the spectrum, but the ground-state is two-fold degenerate. An interpretation in terms of SU(4)-singlet plaquettes is proposed. The implications for general two-dimensional lattices are outlined.