Rhombic skyrmion lattice coupled with orthorhombic structural distortion in <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:msub><mml:mi>EuAl</mml:mi><mml:mn>4</mml:mn></mml:msub></mml:math>
Masaki Gen, R. Takagi, Yoshito Watanabe, Shunsuke Kitou, Hajime Sagayama, Naofumi Matsuyama, Yoshimitsu Kohama, Akihiko Ikeda, Yoshichika Ōnuki, Takashi Kurumaji, T. Arima, S. Seki
Abstract
The centrosymmetric tetragonal itinerant magnet ${\mathrm{EuAl}}_{4}$ exhibits an intricate magnetic phase diagram including rhombic and square skyrmion-lattice (SkL) phases in the external magnetic field. Here, we report a multi-axis dilatometric investigation of ${\mathrm{EuAl}}_{4}$ by means of a newly designed fiber-Bragg-grating technique complemented by a resonant x-ray scattering experiment, revealing anisotropic magnetostriction and magnetovolume effect associated with successive phase transitions. The rhombic and square SkL phases are found to possess $\ensuremath{\sim}0.10$% and $\ensuremath{\sim}0.03$% orthorhombic structural distortion within the $ab$ plane, respectively. We propose that the coupling between the spin system and the lattice deformation should be essential for the structural instability in ${\mathrm{EuAl}}_{4}$, yielding a rich variety of topological spin textures with spontaneous rotational-symmetry breaking as well as a potential controllability of the SkL phases by uniaxial stress or pressure.