The 2020 skyrmionics roadmap Back, C; Cros, V; Ebert, H ...
Journal of physics. D, Applied physics,
09/2020, Letnik:
53, Številka:
36
Journal Article
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The notion of non-trivial topological winding in condensed matter systems represents a major area of present-day theoretical and experimental research. Magnetic materials offer a versatile platform ...that is particularly amenable for the exploration of topological spin solitons in real space such as skyrmions. First identified in non-centrosymmetric bulk materials, the rapidly growing zoology of materials systems hosting skyrmions and related topological spin solitons includes bulk compounds, surfaces, thin films, heterostructures, nano-wires and nano-dots. This underscores an exceptional potential for major breakthroughs ranging from fundamental questions to applications as driven by an interdisciplinary exchange of ideas between areas in magnetism which traditionally have been pursued rather independently. The skyrmionics Roadmap provides a review of the present state of the art and the wide range of research directions and strategies currently under way. These are, for instance, motivated by the identification of the fundamental structural properties of skyrmions and related textures, processes of nucleation and annihilation in the presence of non-trivial topological winding, an exceptionally efficient coupling to spin currents generating spin transfer torques at tiny current densities, as well as the capability to purpose-design broad-band spin dynamic and logic devices.
A scheme is presented that is based on the alloy analogy model and allows one to account for thermal lattice vibrations as well as spin fluctuations when calculating response quantities in solids. ...Various models to deal with spin fluctuations are discussed concerning their impact on the resulting temperature-dependent magnetic moment, longitudinal conductivity, and Gilbert damping parameter. It is demonstrated that, by using the Monte Carlo (MC) spin configuration as input, the alloy analogy model is capable of reproducing the results of MC simulations on the average magnetic moment within all spin fluctuation models under discussion. On the other hand, the response quantities are much more sensitive to the spin fluctuation model. Separate calculations accounting for the thermal effect due to either lattice vibrations or spin fluctuations show that they give comparable contributions to the electrical conductivity and Gilbert damping. However, comparison to results accounting for both thermal effects demonstrates violation of Matthiessen's rule, showing the nonadditive effect of lattice vibrations and spin fluctuations. The results obtained for bcc Fe and fcc Ni are compared with the experimental data, showing rather good agreement for the temperature-dependent electrical conductivity and the Gilbert damping parameter.
An extension of the Heisenberg Hamiltonian is discussed that allows us to go beyond the standard bilinear spin Hamiltonian taking into account various contributions due to multispin interactions ...having both chiral and nonchiral character. The parameters of the extended Hamiltonian are calculated from first principles within the framework of the multiple-scattering Green's function formalism giving access to an explicit representation of these parameters in real space. The discussions are focused on the chiral interactions, i.e., biquadratic and three-spin Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya-like vector interactions D⃗ijij (BDMI) and D⃗ijkj (TDMI), respectively, as well as the three-spin chiral interaction Jijk. Although all parameters are driven by spin-orbit coupling (SOC), some differences in their properties are demonstrated by calculations for real materials. In particular it is shown that the three-spin chiral interactions Jijk may be topology as well as SOC induced, while the TDMI is associated only with the SOC. As the magnitude of the chiral interactions can be quite sizable, they can lead to a stabilization of a noncollinear magnetic texture in some materials that is absent when these interactions are neglected.
As a fundamental parameter in magnetism, the phenomenological Gilbert damping constant α determines the performance of many spintronic devices. For most magnetic materials, α is treated as an ...isotropic parameter entering the Landau–Lifshitz–Gilbert equation. However, could the Gilbert damping be anisotropic? Although several theoretical approaches have suggested that anisotropic α could appear in single-crystalline bulk systems, experimental evidence of its existence is scarce. Here, we report the emergence of anisotropic magnetic damping by exploring a quasi-two-dimensional single-crystalline ferromagnetic metal/semiconductor interface—that is, a Fe/GaAs(001) heterojunction. The observed anisotropic damping shows twofold C2v symmetry, which is expected from the interplay of interfacial Rashba and Dresselhaus spin–orbit interaction, and is manifested by the anisotropic density of states at the Fe/GaAs (001) interface. This discovery of anisotropic damping will enrich the understanding of magnetization relaxation mechanisms and can provide a route towards the search for anisotropic damping at other ferromagnetic metal/semiconductor interfaces.
A method for the calculations of the Gilbert damping parameter alpha is presented, which, based on the linear response formalism, has been implemented within the fully relativistic ...Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker band structure method in combination with the coherent potential approximation alloy theory. To account for thermal displacements of atoms as a scattering mechanism, an alloy-analogy model is introduced. This allows the determination of alpha for various types of materials, such as elemental magnetic systems and ordered magnetic compounds at finite temperature, as well as for disordered magnetic alloys at T = 0 K and above. The effects of spin-orbit coupling, chemical- and temperature-induced structural disorder, are analyzed. Calculations have been performed for the 3d transition metals bcc Fe, hcp Co, and fcc Ni; their binary alloys bcc Fe sub(1-x) Co sub(x), fcc Ni sub(1-x) Fe sub(x), fcc Ni sub(1-x)Co sub(x) and bcc Fe sub(1-x)V sub(x); and for 5d impurities in transition-metal alloys. All results are in satisfying agreement with experiment.
A Kubo-Greenwood-like equation for the Gilbert damping parameter α is presented that is based on the linear response formalism. Its implementation using the fully relativistic Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker ...band structure method in combination with coherent potential approximation alloy theory allows it to be applied to a wide range of situations. This is demonstrated with results obtained for the bcc alloy system Fe(1-x)Co(x) as well as for a series of alloys of Permalloy with 5d transition metals. To account for the thermal displacements of atoms as a scattering mechanism, an alloy-analogy model is introduced. The corresponding calculations for Ni correctly describe the rapid change of α when small amounts of substitutional Cu are introduced.
An accurate scheme to calculate the interatomic Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) parameters is presented, which is based on the fully relativistic Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker Green function ...(KKR-GF) technique. Corresponding numerical results are compared with those obtained using other schemes reported in the literature. The differences found can be attributed primarily to the different reference states used in the various approaches. The advantage of the present approach is that the DMI vectors can in a natural way be connected with the DMI-related torques on local magnetic moments. In addition an expression for the DMI parameters formulated for a micromagnetic model Hamiltonian is presented that provides a connection to the DMI parameters calculated for atomistic Hamiltonians. This formulation also allows the discussion of the DMI in terms of specific features of the electronic band structure.
We employ first-principles alloy theories to assess the influence of local lattice distortions on the electronic transport of six body-centered cubic high-entropy alloys. We find weak disorder ...smearing of bands in the ideal lattice due to the similar number of valence electrons among alloying elements. Allowing relaxation, we demonstrate that local distortions in NbMoTaW and VNbMoTaW are small while they are anomalously large in HfNbTiZr, HfNbTaTiZr, VCrZrNb and CrNbTiVZr. The Fermi surfaces of the latter are strongly smeared by local distortions, leading to nearly-saturated resistivities. These findings address the important local relaxation effect on the electronic structure of high-entropy alloys.
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A spin reorientation accompanying the temperature-induced antiferromagnetic (AFM) to ferromagnetic (FM) phase transition is reported in strained epitaxial FeRh thin films. (57)Fe conversion electron ...Mössbauer spectrometry showed that the Fe moments have different orientations in FeRh grown on thick single-crystalline MgO and in FeRh grown on ion-beam-assist-deposited (IBAD) MgO. It was also observed, in both samples, that the Fe moments switch orientations at the AFM to FM phase transition. Perpendicular anisotropy was evidenced in the AFM phase of the film grown on IBAD MgO and in the FM phase of that grown on regular MgO. Density-functional theory calculations enabled this spin-reorientation transition to be accurately reproduced for both FeRh films across the AFM-FM phase transition and show that these results are due to differences in strain.
Tuning of the anisotropic Gilbert damping Δα has been realized in ultrathin single-crystalline Fe films grown on GaAs (001). A nonmonotonic dependence of Δα on film thickness t is observed upon ...varying t about 10 ML (∼1.4 nm). Δα increases for 16 ML>t>8.5 ML, and then decreases for 8.5 ML>t>6.5 ML accompanied by a sign reversal of Δα for t=6.5 ML. The sign reversal of Δα is captured by first-principle calculations, which show that the anisotropic density of states changes sign upon decreasing t. Moreover, t^{-1} dependence of the anisotropic damping indicates the emergence of an anisotropic effective spin mixing conductance according to the theory of spin pumping. The results establish new opportunities for controlling the Gilbert damping and for fundamental studies of magnetization dynamics in reduced dimension.
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