Abstract
Multiple- magnetic states often induce nontrivial topological spin textures, such as a skyrmion and a hedgehog. We theoretically investigate yet another multiple- state with topological defects, a meron-antimeron crystal (MAX), represented by a periodic array of the meron and antimeron with a half-integer skyrmion number. Performing simulated annealing for an effective spin model of noncentrosymmetric itinerant magnets on a triangular lattice, we show that rectangular-shaped and triangular-shaped MAXs are stabilized by the interplay between the biquadratic interaction arising from the spin-charge coupling and the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction arising from the spin-orbit coupling. We also discuss the effect of a magnetic field on the triangular MAX, where highly anisotropic responses against a field direction are found. In particular, we show that the triangular MAX turns into the skyrmion crystal for the fields along the and directions, while it is replaced by another chiral state for the field along the direction. These results should inspire further experimental investigation of MAXs in itinerant magnets.
3 More- Received 7 July 2021
- Revised 8 September 2021
- Accepted 9 September 2021
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.104.094425
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