57 research outputs found
Controlling skyrmion bubble confinement by dipolar interactions
Large skyrmion bubbles in confined geometries of various sizes and shapes are
investigated, typically in the range of several micrometers. Two fundamentally
different cases are studied to address the role of dipole-dipole interactions:
(I) when there is no magnetic material present outside the small geometries and
(II) when the geometries are embedded in films with a uniform magnetization. It
is found that the preferential position of the skyrmion bubbles can be
controlled by the geometrical shape, which turns out to be a stronger influence
than local variations in material parameters. In addition, independent
switching of the direction of the magnetization outside the small geometries
can be used to further manipulate these preferential positions, in particular
with respect to the edges. We show by numerical calculations that the observed
interactions between the skyrmion bubbles and structure edge including the
overall positioning of the bubbles are fully controlled by dipole-dipole
interactions
Tunable chiral spin texture in magnetic domain-walls
Magnetic domain-walls (DWs) with a preferred chirality exhibit very efficient
current-driven motion. Since structural inversion asymmetry (SIA) is required
for their stability, the observation of chiral domain walls in highly symmetric
Pt/Co/Pt is intriguing. Here, we tune the layer asymmetry in this system and
observe, by current-assisted DW depinning experiments, a small chiral field
which sensitively changes. Moreover, we convincingly link the observed
efficiency of DW motion to the DW texture, using DW resistance as a direct
probe for the internal orientation of the DW under the influence of in-plane
fields. The very delicate effect of capping layer thickness on the chiral field
allows for its accurate control, which is important in designing novel
materials for optimal spin-orbit-torque-driven DW motion.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure
Optimizing propagating spin wave spectroscopy
The frequency difference between two oppositely propagating spin waves can be
used to probe several interesting magnetic properties, such as the
Dzyaloshinkii-Moriya interaction (DMI). Propagating spin wave spectroscopy is a
technique that is very sensitive to this frequency difference. Here we show
several elements that are important to optimize devices for such a measurement.
We demonstrate that for wide magnetic strips there is a need for de-embedding.
Additionally, for these wide strips there is a large parasitic antenna-antenna
coupling that obfuscates any spin wave transmission signal, which is remedied
by moving to smaller strips. The conventional antenna design excites spin waves
with two different wave vectors. As the magnetic layers become thinner, the
resulting resonances move closer together and become very difficult to
disentangle. In the last part we therefore propose and verify a new antenna
design that excites spin waves with only one wave vector. We suggest to use
this antenna design to measure the DMI in thin magnetic layers.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figure
Anomalous direction for skyrmion bubble motion
Magnetic skyrmions are localized topological excitations that behave as
particles and can be mobile, with great potential for novel data storage
devices. In this work, the current-induced dynamics of large skyrmion bubbles
is studied. When skyrmion motion in the direction opposite to the electron flow
is observed, this is usually interpreted as a perpendicular spin current
generated by the spin Hall effect exerting a torque on the chiral N\'{e}el
skyrmion. By designing samples in which the direction of the net generated spin
current can be carefully controlled, we surprisingly show that skyrmion motion
is always against the electron flow, irrespective of the net vertical
spin-current direction. We find that a negative bulk spin-transfer torque is
the most plausible explanation for the observed results, which is qualitatively
justified by a simple model that captures the essential behaviour. These
findings demonstrate that claims about the skyrmion chirality based on their
current-induced motion should be taken with great caution
- …