Abstract
Antiferromagnets have recently moved into the focus of application-related research, with the perspective to use them in future spintronics devices. At the same time the experimental determination of the detailed spin texture remains challenging. Here we use spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy to investigate the spin structure of antiferromagnetic domain walls. Comparison with spin dynamics simulations allows the identification of a new type of domain wall, which is a superposition state of the adjacent domains. We determine the relevant magnetic interactions and derive analytical formulas. Our experiments show a pathway to control the number of domain walls by boundary effects, and demonstrate the possibility to change the position of domain walls by interaction with movable adsorbed atoms. The knowledge about the exact spin structure of the domain walls is crucial for an understanding and theoretical modelling of their properties regarding, for instance, dynamics, response in transport experiments, and manipulation.
Highlights
Antiferromagnets have recently moved into the focus of application-related research, with the perspective to use them in future spintronics devices
A large variety of magnetic systems with vanishing net magnetization falls into this category, including synthetic AFMs2,3, collinear[4,5], non-collinear[6,7,8], and noncoplanar systems[9,10], and AFMs are envisioned to play a prominent role in future spintronic devices[11,12,13]
The row-wise antiferromagnetic (RW-AFM) state is the ground state in the pseudomorphic fcc-stacked Mn layer on Re(0001), as we have demonstrated previously[10] by a combined spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy (SP-STM)[26,27] and density functional theory (DFT) study
Summary
Antiferromagnets have recently moved into the focus of application-related research, with the perspective to use them in future spintronics devices. They show distinct transport properties which can depend on their topology[15] These findings have recently inspired investigations that aim at replacing ferromagnetic materials for future applications with AFMs. In particular, the exploitation of movable solitons, like domain walls (DWs) and skyrmions, has been in the focus of research. It has been pointed out that the large variety of AFM states should allow for a wider range of AFM DW configurations compared to ferromagnets[12] It is expected, that the details of the spin texture within an AFM DW play a crucial role for its properties regarding, for instance, current-induced motion or emerging Hall effects. It is important both for an understanding as well as a tailoring of AFM DW properties to unveil their spin configuration
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
