Magnetic imaging of antiferromagnetic domain walls

Abstract

The control of domain walls or spin textures is crucial for spintronic applications of antiferromagnets. Despite many efforts, it has been challenging to directly visualize antiferromagnetic domains or domain walls with nanoscale resolution, especially in magnetic field. Here, we report magnetic imaging of domain walls in several uniaxial antiferromagnets, the topological insulator MnBi${}_2$Te${}_4$ family and the Dirac semimetal EuMnBi${}_2$, using cryogenic magnetic force microscopy (MFM). Our MFM results reveal higher magnetic susceptibility or net moments inside the domain walls than in domains. Domain walls in these antiferromagnets form randomly with strong thermal and magnetic field dependences. The direct visualization of domain walls and domain structure in magnetic field will not only facilitate the exploration of intrinsic phenomena in topological antiferromagnets, but also open a new path toward control and manipulation of domain walls or spin textures in functional antiferromagnets.

14 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (4)

• Trajectory of Anomalous Hall Effect toward the Quantized State in a Ferromagnetic Topological Insulator
• Antiferromagnetic topological insulators
• Crystal growth and magnetic structure of MnBi2Te4
• Quantum Hall effect in a bulk antiferromagnet EuMnBi${}_2$ with magnetically confined two-dimensional Dirac fermions

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Robust A-type order and spin-flop transition on the surface of the antiferromagnetic topological insulator MnBi${}_2$Te${}_4$
• Group theory study of the vibrational modes and magnetic order in the topological antiferromagnet MnBi${}_2$Te${}_4$