1. Tailoring magnetic skyrmions by geometric confinement of magnetic structures
- Author
-
Steven S.-L. Zhang, Charudatta Phatak, Olle Heinonen, and Amanda K. Petford-Long
- Subjects
Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous) ,FOS: Physical sciences ,02 engineering and technology ,7. Clean energy ,01 natural sciences ,Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall) ,0103 physical sciences ,010306 general physics ,Anisotropy ,Nonlinear Sciences::Pattern Formation and Solitons ,Condensed Matter::Quantum Gases ,Physics ,Condensed Matter - Materials Science ,Condensed Matter - Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics ,Spintronics ,Condensed matter physics ,Magnetic structure ,Skyrmion ,High Energy Physics::Phenomenology ,Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci) ,Condensed Matter::Mesoscopic Systems and Quantum Hall Effect ,021001 nanoscience & nanotechnology ,Magnetic anisotropy ,Dipole ,Ferromagnetism ,Ginzburg–Landau theory ,0210 nano-technology - Abstract
Nanoscale magnetic skyrmions have interesting static and transport properties that make them candidates for future spintronic devices. Control and manipulation of the size and behavior of skyrmions is thus of crucial importance. Using a Ginzburg-Landau approach, we show theoretically that skyrmions and skyrmion lattices can be stabilized by a spatial modulation of the uniaxial magnetic anisotropy in a thin film of centro-symmetric ferromagnet. Remarkably, the skyrmion size is determined by the ratio of the exchange length and the period of the spatial modulation of the anisotropy, at variance with conventional skyrmions stabilized by dipolar and Dzyaloshinskii--Moriya interactions (DMIs)., Comment: 9 pages (single column), 3 figures
- Published
- 2017