Hedgehog-lattice spin texture in classical Heisenberg antiferromagnets on the breathing pyrochlore lattice

Abstract

The hedgehog lattice, a three-dimensional periodic array of magnetic monopoles and antimonopoles, is known to be realized in the presence of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI). Here, the authors report a new mechanism other than the conventional DMI. They demonstrate that the hedgehog lattice can be induced by frustration in DMI-free antiferromagnets on the breathing pyrochlore lattice and that an applied magnetic field leads to a nonzero net spin chirality, which, in a metallic system, should yield the so-called topological Hall effect.

Topics & Concepts