Magnetic Adatom Induced Skyrmion-Like Spin Texture in Surface Electron Waves

Lounis, S.; Blügel, S.; Bringer, A.

doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.207202

Journal Article

PreJuSER-22314

Magnetic Adatom Induced Skyrmion-Like Spin Texture in Surface Electron Waves

Lounis, S.FZJ* ; Bringer, A.FZJ* ; Blügel, S.FZJ*

2012
APS College Park, Md.

Physical review letters 108, 07202 (2012) [10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.207202]

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Please use a persistent id in citations: http://hdl.handle.net/2128/7525 doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.207202

Abstract: When a foreign atom is placed on a surface of a metal, the surrounding sea of electrons responds by screening the additional charge leading to oscillations or ripples. On surfaces, those electrons are sometimes confined to two-dimensional surface states, whose spin-degeneracy is lifted due to the Rashba effect arising from the spin-orbit interaction of electrons and the inversion asymmetric environment. It is believed that at least for a single adatom scanning tunneling microscopy measurements are insensitive to the Rashba splitting; i.e., no signatures in the charge oscillations will be observed. Resting on scattering theory, we demonstrate that, if magnetic, one single adatom is enough to visualize the presence of the Rashba effect in terms of an induced spin magnetization of the surrounding electrons exhibiting a twisted spin texture described as superposition of two Skyrmionic waves of opposite chirality.

Keyword(s): J

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Physics, Multidisciplinary

Note: We thank Professor K. Scharnberg for stimulating discussions at the initial stage of the work, and Dr. P. Lazic and Dr. H. Schumacher for their assistance in preparing some of the figures. S. L. acknowledges the support of the HGF-YIG Programme VH-NG-717 (Functional Nanoscale Structure and Probe Simulation Laboratory, Funsilab).

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