Skyrmion fluctuations at a first-order phase transition boundary

Authors

V. Esposito, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
X. Y. Zheng, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
M. H. Seaberg, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
S. A. Montoya, Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific
B. Holladay, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
A. H. Reid, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
R. Streubel, Lawrence Berkeley National LaboratoryFollow
J. C.T. Lee, University of Oregon
L. Shen, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
J. D. Koralek, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
G. Coslovich, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
P. Walter, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
S. Zohar, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
V. Thampy, Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource
M. F. Lin, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
P. Hart, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
K. Nakahara, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
P. Fischer, Lawrence Berkeley National LaboratoryFollow
W. Colocho, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
A. Lutman, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
F. J. Decker, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
S. K. Sinha, University of California, San Diego
E. E. Fullerton, Center for Memory and Recording Research
S. D. Kevan, University of Oregon
S. Roy, Advanced Light Source, Berkeley
M. Dunne, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
J. J. Turner, SLAC National Accelerator LaboratoryFollow

Date of this Version

5-4-2020

Document Type

Article

Citation

Appl. Phys. Lett. 116, 181901 (2020);

doi: 10.1063/5.0004879

Comments

All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license

Abstract

Magnetic skyrmions are topologically protected spin textures with promising prospects for applications in data storage. They can form a lattice state due to competing magnetic interactions and are commonly found in a small region of the temperature - magnetic field phase diagram. Recent work has demonstrated that these magnetic quasi-particles fluctuate at the μeV energy scale. Here, we use a coherent x-ray correlation method at an x-ray free-electron laser to investigate these fluctuations in a magnetic phase coexistence region near a first-order transition boundary where fluctuations are not expected to play a major role. Surprisingly, we find that the relaxation of the intermediate scattering function at this transition differs significantly compared to that deep in the skyrmion lattice phase. The observation of a compressed exponential behavior suggests solid-like dynamics, often associated with jamming. We assign this behavior to disorder and the phase coexistence observed in a narrow field-window near the transition, which can cause fluctuations that lead to glassy behavior.