Thickness dependence of the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya interaction in inversion symmetry broken systems

Jaehun Cho (1) , Nam-Hui Kim (1) , Sukmock Lee (1) , June-Seo Kim (2) , Reinoud Lavrijsen (2) , Aurelie Solignac (3, 2) , Yuxiang Yin (2) , Dong-Soo Han (2) , Niels J. J. van Hoof (1, 2) , Henk J.M. Swagten (2) , Bert Koopmans (2) , Chun-Yeol You (1)

1 Department of Physics, Inha University Incheon
2 TU/e - Eindhoven University of Technology [Eindhoven]
3 LNO - Laboratoire Nano-Magnétisme et Oxydes

In magnetic multilayer systems, a large spin-orbit coupling at the interface between heavy metals and ferromagnets can lead to intriguing phenomena such as the perpendicular magnetic anisotropy, the spin Hall effect, the Rashba effect, and especially the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya (IDM) interaction. This interfacial nature of the IDM interaction has been recently revisited because of its scientific and technological potential. Here we demonstrate an experimental technique to straightforwardly observe the IDM interaction, namely Brillouin light scattering. The non-reciprocal spin wave dispersions, systematically measured by Brillouin light scattering, allow not only the determination of the IDM energy densities beyond the regime of perpendicular magnetization but also the revelation of the inverse proportionality with the thickness of the magnetic layer, which is a clear signature of the interfacial nature. Altogether, our experimental and theoretical approaches involving double time Green's function methods open up possibilities for exploring magnetic hybrid structures for engineering the IDM interaction.

Keywords: Applied physics; Ferromagnetism; Quantum mechanics; Spintronics

Domains: Physics [physics]

Jaehun Cho, Nam-Hui Kim, Sukmock Lee, June-Seo Kim, Reinoud Lavrijsen, et al.. Thickness dependence of the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya interaction in inversion symmetry broken systems. Nature Communications, 2015, 6, pp.7635. ⟨10.1038/ncomms8635⟩. ⟨cea-01485850⟩