Recently, Wei SUN, a Ph.D. candidate from the school of Physics and Electronics, has made new progress in the study of magnetic skyrmions. The related paper entitled with "Manipulation of Magnetic Skyrmion in a 2D van der Waals Heterostructure via Both Electric and Magnetic Fields" has been published in Advanced Functional Materials (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adfm.202104452 ). Wei SUN is the first author, Dr. Hang Li of Henan University and Prof. Zhenxiang Cheng of University of Wollongong of Australia are the corresponding authors.

As a promising candidate for the much-desired low power consumption spintronic devices, 2D magnetic van der Waals material also provides a versatile platform for the design and control of topological spin textures. In this work on WTe₂/CrCl₃ bilayer van der Waals heterostructures, a complete Néel-type skyrmion–bimeron–ferromagnet phase transition is demonstrated, accompanied by the evolution of the topological number. This cyclic transition, mediated by a perpendicular magnetic field, is largely driven by the competition between the out-of-plane magnetocrystalline anisotropy and magnetic dipole–dipole interaction. In the presence of a driving current, the Néel-type skyrmion gains a higher velocity yet larger skyrmion Hall angle, in comparison to the bimeron. By incorporating a ferroelectric CuInP₂S₆ monolayer as a substrate, writing and erasing of skyrmions may be regulated using a ferroelectric polarization. This work sheds light on a novel approach to the design and control of magnetic skyrmions on 2D van der Waals materials.

The research work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Henan University.

Advanced Functional Materials is a Nature Index journal and top international journal owned by Wiley. The latest published impact factor of the journal in 2020 is 18.808.

The link to the paper is https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adfm.202104452.

(From: School of Physics and Electronics)