Curvature effects in vortex chirality switching

Abstract

A simple mechanism of controllable switching of magnetic vortex chirality is proposed. We consider curvilinear magnetic nanoshells of spherical geometry whose ground state is a vortex magnetization distribution. Chirality of this magnetic vortex can be switched in controllable way by applying a Gaussian pulse of spatially uniform magnetic field along the symmetry axis of the shell. The chirality switching process is explored in detail numerically for various parameters of magnetic pulse: the corresponding switching diagram is build. The role of the curvature is ascertained by studying the switching diagram evolution under the continuous transition from hemispherical shell to the disk shaped sample with the volume and thickness kept constant.