Publikationsrepositorium - Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf

In recent years, curvilinear nanomagnetism is attracting attention for the broad range of effects emerging in curved geometries that are appealing for the innovative developments in stretchable and magnetoelectric devices, microrobots, sensors, flexible magnetic memories and nanoelectronics [1-5].
These phenomena encompass a vast range of exchange- and Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DMI)- induced interactions that typically result in topological magnetization patterning in shells, chiral symmetry breaking, and pinning of domain walls [1-5]. Less attention has been paid though to the role of the curvilinear effects in the magnetization dynamics of domain walls in curved geometries [4]. From application perspectives, spin-orbit torques are appealing as an alternative way to achieve the manipulation of magnetic domain walls and magnetization [8] with the breakthrough of lower power consumption. Recent developments in ultra-thin planar asymmetric multilayered strips describe a method to extract DMI and damping estimations from the dynamical tilt of domain walls from static measurements [9]. Following a similar approach, here we provide first results in single 100 nm-wide thin periodically corrugated strips of CrOx/Co/Pt with thickness of 2 nm and average curvature of 0.06 nm-1, tailored for an enhanced exchange-induced DMI. The orientation of the corrugation is tuned from the parallel to the perpendicular direction of the strip axis in different strips.
Our results indicate that curvature plays a crucial role in the pinning and tilting of domain walls through DMI-induced and exchange-induced effects. In particular, DMI-induced anisotropy leads the pinning mechanism, while its combination with exchange-induced effects enhances the domain wall tilt. This opens a perspective for quantification and design of curvature-induced effects with application prospects in current challenges of spin-based nanoelectronics [10].

[1] Denys Makarov, et al., Advanced Materials 34, 3 (2022)
[2] Denis D Sheka, Oleksandr V Pylypovskyi et al., Small 18, 12 (2022)
[3] D. Sander et al., J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 50, 363001 (2017).
[4] E. Y. Vedmedenko, et al., J. Phys. D. Appl. Phys. 53, 453001 (2020).
[5] D. Makarov et al., Applied Physics Reviews 3, 011101 (2016).
[6] E. Berganza et al., Sci Rep 12, 3426 (2022)
[7] J.A. Fernandez-Roldan et al., Sci Rep 9, 5130 (2019).
[8] O. V. Pylypovskyi et al., Scientific Reports 6, 23316 (2016).
[9] O. M. Volkov et al., Phys. Rev. Applied 15, 034038 (2021)
[10] B. Dieny, et al., Nat Electron 3, 446 (2020).