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Properties of the skyrmion crystal in the Heisenberg triangular lattice with scalar chirality

H. Bocquet1,*, C. J. Ganahl2,†, M. S. Scheurer3,‡, P. M. Derlet1,§, and A. M. Läuchli1,4

  • *Contact author: h.bocquet@protonmail.ch
  • †Contact author: clemens.ganahl@student.uibk.ac.at
  • ‡Contact author: mathias.scheurer@itp3.uni-stuttgart.de
  • §Contact author: peter.derlet@psi.ch
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Phys. Rev. B 114, 204416 – Published 15 October, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/fg74-7ssk

Abstract

Skyrmion crystals have been primarily discovered under a magnetic field for materials with noncentrosymmetric interactions. More recent developments have investigated the stability of skyrmion crystals in itinerant magnets without a magnetic field. In this study, we find that a type of skyrmion crystal with two topological charges per unit cell and no magnetization at the ferromagnetic point in reciprocal space, SkX-2, is naturally stabilized in an SO(3)-symmetric model with short-range interactions realized by the Heisenberg model on the triangular lattice with scalar chirality. We complement our numerical results with a theoretical analysis that quantitatively describes the transition from the ferromagnetic to the SkX-2 ground state and the evolution of the topological charge density. Despite the constraints given by the Mermin-Wagner theorem at finite temperature, the SkX-2 can either exhibit a first-order phase transition with translation symmetry breaking, or a continuous transition to a floating solid depending on the charge density, which is given by the strength of the scalar chirality interaction. Finally, the numerical results indicate the presence of Z2-vortices at finite temperature above the tetrahedral ground state in the antiferromagnetic region of our model, suggesting the existence of a vortex topological transition similar to that reported in the ordering of the pure antiferromagnetic model.

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Phys. Rev. B 114, 204416– Published 15 October, 2026
  • Received 25 May 2026
  • Revised 28 July 2026
  • Accepted 1 September 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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