Crystalline phases in chiral ferromagnets: Destabilization of helical order

Abstract

In chiral ferromagnets, weak spin-orbit interactions twist the ferromagnetic order into spirals, leading to helical order. We investigate an extended Ginzburg-Landau theory of such systems where the helical order is destabilized in favor of crystalline phases. These crystalline phases are based on periodic arrangements of double-twist cylinders and are strongly reminiscent of blue phases in liquid crystals. We discuss the relevance of such blue phases for the phase diagram of the chiral ferromagnet MnSi.

6 pages, 5 figures (published version)

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Skyrmions and Anomalous Hall Effect in a Dzyloshinskii-Moriya Spiral Magnet
• Origin and consequence of an unpinned helical magnet: application to partial order in MnSi under pressure