Widely-sweeping magnetic field-temperature phase diagrams for skyrmion-hosting centrosymmetric tetragonal magnets

TL;DR

This study uses numerical simulations to map out magnetic field-temperature phase diagrams in centrosymmetric tetragonal magnets, revealing mechanisms that stabilize skyrmion crystals and other multiple-Q states influenced by thermal fluctuations and magnetic fields.

Contribution

It introduces an efficient numerical method to systematically construct phase diagrams and identifies specific interactions that stabilize skyrmion crystals at finite temperatures.

Findings

Square-type skyrmion crystal stabilized by high-harmonic or biquadratic interactions.

High-harmonic interaction stabilizes skyrmions only at finite temperatures.

Discovery of multiple-Q states beyond skyrmion crystals.

Abstract

We numerically investigate the stabilization mechanisms of skyrmion crystals under thermal fluctuations and external magnetic field in itinerant centrosymmetric tetragonal magnets. By adopting an efficient steepest descent method with a small computational cost, we systematically construct the magnetic field-temperature phase diagrams of the effective spin model derived from the itinerant electron model on a two-dimensional square lattice. As a result, we find that a square-type skyrmion crystal is stabilized by either or both of the high-harmonic wave-vector interaction and the biquadratic interaction under an external magnetic field. Especially, we discover that the former high-harmonic wave-vector interaction can stabilize the skyrmion crystal only at finite temperatures when its magnitude is small. In addition to the skyrmion crystal, we also find other stable multiple-$Q$ states in the phase diagram. Lastly, we discuss the correspondence of the phase diagrams between the effective spin model and the skyrmion-hosting material GdRu$_2$Si$_2$. The present results suggest a variety of multiple-$Q$ states could be driven by thermal fluctuations and external magnetic fields in centrosymmetric itinerant magnets.