Pattern formation in skyrmionic materials with anisotropic environments

Abstract

Magnetic Skyrmions have attracted broad attention during recent years because they are regarded as promising candidates as bits of information in novel data storage devices. A broad range of theoretical and experimental investigations have been conducted with the consideration of axisymmetric Skyrmions in isotropic environments. However, one naturally observes a huge variety of anisotropic behavior in many experimentally relevant materials. In the present work, we investigate the influence of anisotropic environments onto the formation and behavior of the noncollinear spin states of skyrmionic materials by means of Monte Carlo calculations. We find skyrmionic textures which are far from having an axisymmetric shape. Furthermore, we show the possibility to employ periodic modulations of the environment to create skyrmionic tracks.