Regensburg 2019 – scientific programme

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O: Fachverband Oberflächenphysik

O 99: Focus Session: Spins on Surfaces III (joint session O/MA)

O 99.4: Talk

Friday, April 5, 2019, 11:30–11:45, H24

Noncollinear spin density of an adatom on a magnetic surface — •Soumyajyoti Haldar and Stefan Heinze — Institute of Theoretical Physics and Astrophysics, University of Kiel, 24098, Kiel, Germany

Today, noncollinear spin structures at surfaces and interfaces receive great attention due to potential applications in spintronic devices. In such magnetic structures, the spin direction changes from atom to atom. Besides this inter-atomic noncollinear magnetism, there is also intra-atomic noncollinear magnetism in which the spin direction varies for different orbitals of an atom [1]. It can occur due to spin-orbit coupling or due to a noncollinear spin structure.

Here, we demonstrate that intra-atomic noncollinear magnetism can occur for adatoms on a magnetic surface with a noncollinear spin structure [2]. As an example, we study Co and Ir adatoms on Mn/W(110) using density functional theory. We find that the canted spin structure of the Mn surface layer is encoded into different orbitals of the adatoms. Our conclusions apply in general to adatoms on surfaces with a noncollinear magnetic structure e.g. spin spirals, skyrmions or domain walls and explain recent experimental results of spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy experiments [3].
[1] L. Nordström et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 76, 4420 (1996)

[2] S. Haldar and S. Heinze, arXiv:1811.00865 (2018)

[3] D. Serrate et al., Phys. Rev. B 93, 125424 (2016)