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O: Fachverband Oberflächenphysik

O 13: Poster Session I: Surface magnetism I

O 13.6: Poster

Monday, March 1, 2021, 10:30–12:30, P

Temperature and magnetic field dependent behavior of atomic-scale skyrmions in Pd/Fe/Ir(111) nanoislands — •Philipp Lindner, Lennart Bargsten, Stepan Kovaric, Johannes Friedlein, Jonas Harm, Stefan Krause, and Roland Wiesendanger — Department of Physics, University of Hamburg, Jungiusstraße 11A, 20355 Hamburg, Germany

The thermal stability of atomic-scale skyrmions is of high relevance for potential spintronics applications and validation of theoretical models, but atomic-scale skyrmion observation was hitherto limited to very low temperatures.
In our recent study [1], we employed our unique experimental setup [2] to systematically explore the thermomagnetic phase space of Pd/Fe nanoislands on an Ir(111) substrate in an external magnetic field up to 3 T within the temperature range between 1 K and 100 K via scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy.
Evidence is found for the spin spiral, field-polarized and fluctuating disordered magnetic phases. Irrespective of considerable thermally driven magnetization dynamics, evidence for skyrmions is found at up to approximately 80 K. This critical temperature is almost tripled compared to the Fe/Ir(111) system without Pd capping [3], thereby demonstrating the stabilization of atomic-scale skyrmions against thermal agitation by highly polarizable adlayers.

[1] P. Lindner et al., Phys. Rev. B 101, 214445 (2020).
[2] J. Friedlein et al., Rev. Sci. Instrum. 90, 123705 (2019).
[3] A. Sonntag et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 077202 (2014).