Abstract
Defects are unavoidable in real materials. Defects, either intrinsic or artificially incorporated, can alter the material properties. In the particular case of skyrmionic ferromagnetic materials, defects modify the stability and dynamics of the skyrmions. These magnetic structures have aroused great interest due to their potential as information carriers. Hence, the knowledge and control of the influence of defects on skyrmions are essential for their use in applications, such as magnetic memories or information mobility. Aiming to give an overview on defect simulations, we review the most relevant approaches to simulate defects in ferromagnetic materials, hosting skyrmions depending on their size, nature, strength, and quantity.
Highlights
Magnetic skyrmions[1,2] are whirling magnetic structures with nanometric size, high mobility,[3,4,5,6] and topological protection.[7,8] These magnetic structures can appear in single crystals of magnetic compounds with a non-centrosymmetric lattice[9] due to the existence of a chiral interaction
Skyrmions are observed in ultrathin magnetic films epitaxially grown on top of heavy-metal substrates which are subject to large DM interaction
The interaction is induced at the interface[10,11,12] by the breaking of inversion symmetry due to the strong spin–orbit coupling of the neighboring heavy metal
Summary
Magnetic skyrmions[1,2] are whirling magnetic structures with nanometric size, high mobility,[3,4,5,6] and topological protection.[7,8] These magnetic structures can appear in single crystals of magnetic compounds with a non-centrosymmetric lattice[9] due to the existence of a chiral interaction This interaction, named Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya (DM) interaction, is induced by spin–orbit coupling in the absence of inversion symmetry in the crystal lattice (bulk DM interaction). Skyrmions are observed in ultrathin magnetic films epitaxially grown on top of heavy-metal substrates which are subject to large DM interaction.
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