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  • Open Access

Quantum Hall Effect without Chern Bands

Benjamin Michen1,* and Jan Carl Budich1,2,†

  • *Contact author: benjamin.michen@tu-dresden.de
  • †Contact author: jan.budich@tu-dresden.de
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Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 186603 – Published 30 October, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/dgd8-4gzf

Abstract

The quantum Hall effect was originally observed in a two-dimensional electron gas forming Landau levels when exposed to a strong perpendicular magnetic field and was later generalized to Chern insulators without net magnetization. Here, further extending the realm of the quantum Hall effect, we report on the robust occurrence of an integer quantized transverse conductance at the onset of disorder in a microscopic lattice model, all bands of which are topologically trivial (zero Chern number). We attribute this phenomenon to the energetic separation of nonquantized Berry fluxes within those bands. Adding disorder then nudges the system into a quantum Hall phase from an extended critical regime obtained by placing the Fermi energy within a broad window inside a trivial band. This natural integer-rounding mechanism manifests as the mobility-gap-induced quantization of a nonuniversal Hall conductance. Our results are corroborated by numerical transport simulations and the analysis of two complementary topological markers.

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Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 186603– Published 30 October, 2025
  • Received 16 May 2025
  • Revised 12 August 2025
  • Accepted 6 October 2025
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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. Open access publication funded by the Max Planck Society.

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