Emergence of Topological Electron Crystals in Bilayer Graphene--Mott Insulator Heterostructures

Wangqian Miao; Tianyu Qiao; Xue-Yang Song; Yinghai Xu; Yiwei Chen; Lei Wang; Xi Dai

doi:10.1016/j.newton.2026.100638

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arXiv · 2512.23084

Emergence of Topological Electron Crystals in Bilayer Graphene--Mott Insulator Heterostructures

Wangqian Miao·Tianyu Qiao·Xue-Yang Song·Yinghai Xu·Yiwei Chen·Lei Wang·Xi Dai

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Abstract

The interplay between strong electron correlation and band topology offers a playground for discovering exotic quantum phases. Here, we predict the emergence of topological electron crystals in a charge-transfer bilayer graphene-Mott insulator heterostructure. In this system, interlayer charge transfer induces a charge-neutral electron-hole bilayer with strong mass asymmetry. While the extreme dilute limit favors a classical triangular dipolar Wigner crystal, we show that increasing the carrier density triggers a critical competition between the Coulomb interaction and the underlying topological band structure of bilayer graphene. This interplay destabilizes the triangular dipolar Wigner crystal and instead stabilizes intrinsic quantum electron crystals with spontaneously formed honeycomb and kagome geometries. Crucially, these new phases can host distinct topological responses including the quantum anomalous and quantum spin Hall effects, which inherit the nonlocal quantum geometry of the bilayer graphene wave functions. Our results establish this artificial heterostructure as a highly tunable platform for mimicking two-dimensional topological solids in a single device.

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Wangqian Miao, Tianyu Qiao, Xue-Yang Song, Yinghai Xu, Yiwei Chen, Lei Wang, Xi Dai. 2026-08-01. Emergence of Topological Electron Crystals in Bilayer Graphene--Mott Insulator Heterostructures. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.newton.2026.100638

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