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MA: Fachverband Magnetismus

MA 5: Spin Textures and magnetic Phase Transitions

MA 5.1: Invited Talk

Monday, March 7, 2016, 09:30–10:00, H34

Néel-type skyrmions in a type-I multiferroic compound — •Istvan Kezsmarki¹, Sandor Bordacs¹, Peter Milde², Jonathan White³, Vladimir Tsurkan⁴, and Alois Loidl⁴ — ¹Department of Physics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary — ²Institut für Angewandte Photophysik, TU Dresden, Dresden, Germany — ³Laboratory for Neutron Scattering and Imaging, Paul Scherrer Institut, Villigen, Switzerland — ⁴Experimental Physics V, Center for Electronic Correlations and Magnetism, University of Augsburg, Augsburg, Germany

GaV4S8, a member of the lacunar spinel family, is the first known example of skyrmion-host materials with non-chiral but polar crystal structure. This compound is a magnetic semiconductor with a rhombohedral crystal symmetry (R3m) and an easy-axis magnetic anisotropy. In this compound we observed the formation of a Néel-type skyrmion lattice, which exists over a broad temperature range [1]. This is in contrast to Bloch-type skyrmions found in chiral magnets, which are stabilized by thermal fluctuations in small pockets of the phase diagram. We found that the orientation of these Néel-type skyrmions is not controlled by the external magnetic field, but instead confined to the magnetic easy axis. Due to the polar nature of the host crystal, these magnetic skyrmions wear a ferroelectric dressing and exhibit strong static and dynamic magnetoelectric effects [2,3].

[1] I. Kézsmárki et al., Nat. Mater. 14, 1116 (2015) [2] E. Ruff et al., Sci. Advances 1, e1500916 (2015) [3] Z. Wang et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 115, 207601 (2015)