Temperature Dependent Magnetism in Artificial Honeycomb Lattice of Connected Elements

TL;DR

This study reports the creation of an ultra-small artificial honeycomb magnetic lattice and investigates its temperature-dependent magnetic correlations, revealing vortex loop states at low temperatures through magnetic and neutron scattering measurements.

Contribution

The paper introduces a new ultra-small permalloy honeycomb lattice and demonstrates temperature-dependent magnetic correlation evolution, including vortex loop states, using experimental and simulation methods.

Findings

Development of a new ultra-small honeycomb lattice with 12 nm bonds

Observation of magnetic correlation evolution with temperature

Evidence of vortex loop states at low temperatures

Abstract

Artificial magnetic honeycomb lattices are expected to exhibit a broad and tunable range of novel magnetic phenomena that would be difficult to achieve in natural materials, such as long-range spin ice, entropy-driven magnetic charge-ordered state and spin-order due to the spin chirality. Eventually, the spin correlation is expected to develop into a unique spin solid state density ground state, manifested by the distribution of the pairs of vortex states of opposite chirality. Here we report the creation of a new artificial permalloy honeycomb lattice of ultra-small connecting bonds, with a typical size of $\simeq$ 12 nm. Detail magnetic and neutron scattering measurements on the newly fabricated honeycomb lattice demonstrate the evolution of magnetic correlation as a function of temperature. At low enough temperature, neutron scattering measurements and micromagnetic simulation suggest the development of loop state of vortex configuration in this system.