Laboratoire de Physique Théorique
Toulouse - UMR 5152

Non-magnetic impurities break a quantum spin chain into finite segments and induce Friedel-like oscillations in the local susceptibility near the edges. The signature of these oscillations has been observed in Knight shift experiments on the high-temperature superconductor YBaCuO and on the spin-chain compound SrCuO. Here we analytically calculate NMR spectra, compare with the experimental data, and give a simple criterion to determine the impurity concentration. Our results are based on a parameter-free formula for the local susceptibility of a finite spin chain obtained by bosonization which is checked by comparing with quantum Monte Carlo calculations.