Magnetic skyrmions in chiral multilayers

In this project we will study magnetic skyrmions, nanoscale swirls of spins that possess a special topology. They appear in properly designed magnetic multilayers at room temperature and are candidates for next-generation data storage technology. It is now over a decade since the carbon footprint of the internet grew larger than that of commercial air travel, much of this energy is used to physically spin hard disks, write data to them, and write and refresh volatile memory. To drive skyrmions along a crystal using spin torque requires several orders of magnitude less current density then driving magnetic domains under ideal conditions, but this is not seen in practice in these systems so far. Magnetic skyrmions offer the prospect of vastly reducing the energy needed to write and store digital data if their properties can be controlled.

In Leeds we have a rich programme of research on skyrmions carried out with several leading European laboratories in Italy, Germany and Switzerland, as well as academnic and industrial partners in the UK. Potential topics for PhD study include studying ways to reduce the skyrmion Hall angle for their easier use in spintronic devices [Zeissler et al., Nature Commun. (2020), https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14232-9], studying the transport properties of skyrmions as a means of electrically detecting them [Zeissler et al., Nature Nanotech, (2018), https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-018-0268-y], and the mobility of skyrmions at room temperature under the influence of novel drives such as spin waves or enhanced spin-orbit torques.