Electron beam lithography of magnetic skyrmions

DOI: 10.1002/adma.202003003

Authors: Yao Guang (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences) , Yong Peng (Lanzhou University) , Zhengren Yan (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences) , Yizhou Liu (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences) , Junwei Zhang (Lanzhou University; King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)) , Xue Zeng (Lanzhou Jiaotong University) , Senfu Zhang (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)) , Shilei Zhang (ShanghaiTech University) , David M. Burn (Diamond Light Source) , Nicolas Jaouen (Synchrotron SOLEIL) , Jinwu Wei (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory) , Hongjun Xu (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory) , Jiafeng Feng (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences) , Chi Fang (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences) , Gerrit Van Der Laan (Diamond Light Source) , Thorsten Hesjedal (University of Oxford) , Baoshan Cui (Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory) , Xixiang Zhang (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)) , Guoqiang Yu (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory) , Xiufeng Han (Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory)
Co-authored by industrial partner: No

Type: Journal Paper
Journal: Advanced Materials

State: Published (Approved)
Published: August 2020
Diamond Proposal Number(s): 20183 , 21868

Abstract: The emergence of magnetic skyrmions, topological spin textures, has aroused tremendous interest in studying the rich physics related to their topology. While skyrmions promise high‐density and energy‐efficient magnetic memory devices for information technology, the manifestation of their nontrivial topology through single skyrmions and ordered and disordered skyrmion lattices could also give rise to many fascinating physical phenomena, such as chiral magnon and skyrmion glass states. Therefore, generating skyrmions at designated locations on a large scale, while controlling the skyrmion patterns, is the key to advancing topological magnetism. Here, a new, yet general, approach to the “printing” of skyrmions with zero‐field stability in arbitrary patterns on a massive scale in exchange‐biased magnetic multilayers is presented. By exploiting the fact that the antiferromagnetic order can be reconfigured by local thermal excitations, a focused electron beam with a graphic pattern generator to “print” skyrmions is used, which is referred to as skyrmion lithography. This work provides a route to design arbitrary skyrmion patterns, thereby establishing the foundation for further exploration of topological magnetism.

Journal Keywords: electron beam lithography; magnetic skyrmions; skyrmion lattices; transmission electron microscopy

Diamond Keywords: Skyrmions; Data Storage

Subject Areas: Materials, Physics, Information and Communication Technology


Instruments: I10-Beamline for Advanced Dichroism

Other Facilities: SEXTANTS beamline at SOLEIL

Added On: 24/08/2020 13:20

Discipline Tags:

Surfaces Hard condensed matter - electronic properties Physics Electronics Components & Micro-systems Information & Communication Technologies Magnetism Materials Science interfaces and thin films

Technical Tags:

Spectroscopy Circular Dichroism (CD)