Fractional Charges in 2D magnets & Aharonov-Bohm scattering

Nina del Ser, Caltech

Magnetic skyrmions are characterised by an integer topological charge, Q=1, while merons have half-integer winding numbers, Q=1/2. In this talk, I will describe the physics of magnetic textures with fractional topological charge, which is neither integer nor half-integer. Examples of generic magnetic systems which can host such fractional charges include the meeting points between domains in ferromagnetic films with cubic anisotropy or exploding skyrmions. Only fractionally charged defects give rise to an Aharonov-Bohm effect for incident magnons. We investigate this in a numerical scattering experiment by tracking the magnon-induced forces.

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