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arXiv:2503.07689 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Quantum phase diagram of the spin- 1 2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the square-kagome lattice: A tensor network study

Saeed S. Jahromi, Yasir Iqbal

Published Mar 10, 2026• 1 citation
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Abstract

We study the ground-state phase diagram of the spin-$1/2$ antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model on the square-kagome lattice using infinite projected entangled-pair states (iPEPS). By systematically varying the ratio of exchange couplings on triangular and square plaquettes, we establish a complete quantum phase diagram in the thermodynamic limit. In the intermediate-coupling regime, we identify four distinct nonmagnetic phases that are unambiguously characterized as valence-bond crystals (VBCs) by their symmetry-inequivalent patterns of strong and weak spin-spin correlations. These include a plaquette crossed-dimer VBC, a loop-six VBC stabilized around the isotropic point, a generalized pinwheel VBC with reduced rotational symmetry, and a decorated loop-six VBC proximate to ferrimagnetic order. We determine the phase boundaries using a combination of bond-resolved correlation functions, entanglement entropy, and magnetization. For transitions not accompanied by sharp entanglement signatures, we extract the spin gap from finite-field simulations, allowing us to distinguish gapped and gapless VBC phases. At larger coupling ratios, the system undergoes transitions into imperfect and perfect ferrimagnetic states. Our results resolve long-standing ambiguities in the square-kagome Heisenberg model and provide a quantitatively reliable reference for future theoretical and experimental studies of frustrated quantum magnets.

DOI
10.1103/76vf-63zr

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We investigate the ground-state properties of a spin-1 kagome antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model using tensor-network (TN) methods. We obtain the energy per site ${e}_{0}=\ensuremath{-}1.410\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}90(2)$, with D∗=8{D}^{*}=8D∗=8 multiplets retained (i.e., a bond dimension of D=24)D=24)D=24), and ${e}_{0}=\ensuremath{-}1.4116(4)$ from large-DDD extrapolation, by accurate TN calculations directly in the thermodynamic limit. The symmetry between the two kinds of triangles is spontaneously broken, with a relative energy difference of $\ensuremath{\delta}\ensuremath{\approx}19%$, i.e, there is a trimerization (simplex) valence-bond order in the ground state. The spin-spin, dimer-dimer, and chirality-chirality correlation functions are found to decay exponentially with a rather short correlation length, showing that the ground state is gapped. We thus identify the ground state to be a simplex valence-bond crystal. We also discuss the spin-1 bilinear-biquadratic Heisenberg model on a kagome lattice, and determine its ground-state phase diagram. Moreover, we implement non-Abelian symmetries, here spin SU(2), in the TN algorithm, which improves the efficiency greatly and provides insight into the tensor structures.
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