S.L. Zhang, A. Bauer, D.M. Burn, H. Berger, C. Pfleiderer, G. van der Laan and T. Hesjedal
IoP Magnetism Sheffield Apr 2016
Cu2OSeO3 is a chiral ferrimagnetic insulator that carries a hexagonal array of spin whirls, known as a skyrmion lattice. We report the observation of a multidomain skyrmion state near the surface of a Cu2OSeO3 single crystal using soft resonant elastic x-ray scattering. This technique is an ideal tool to probe the magnetic order at the L3 edge of 3d metal compounds giving a depth sensitivity of ?50 nm. We show that for magnetic field directions deviating from the major cubic axes, the single-domain sixfold-symmetric skyrmion lattice breaks up into domains overcoming the propagation directions imposed by the cubic anisotropy. Our findings are discussed in the framework of competing anisotropies and magnetoelectric effects. In magnetoelectric crystals they open up a new way to manipulate the skyrmion lattice state.