Unusual magnetoresistance in cubic B20 Fe0.85Co0.15Si chiral magnets

Abstract

The B20 chiral magnets with broken inversion symmetry and C4 rotation symmetry have attracted much attention. The broken inversion symmetry leads to the Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya that gives rise to the helical and Skyrmion states. We report the unusual magnetoresistance (MR) of B20 chiral magnet Fe0.85Co0.15Si that directly reveals the broken C4 rotation symmetry and shows the anisotropic scattering by Skyrmions with respect to the current directions. The intimacy between unusual MR and broken symmetry is well confirmed by theoretically studying an effective Hamiltonian with spin–orbit coupling. The unusual MR serves as a transport signature for the Skyrmion phase.