@article{33346,
  keywords = {Transmission electron microscopy, Room temperature, Polarization, Magnetism, Electric field, Priority journal, Titanium, Chirality, Circular dichroism, Electric activity, Electric capacitance, Electromagnetism, Letter, Scanning transmission electron microscopy, X-ray Diffraction},
  author = {S Das and Y.L Tang and Z Hong and M.A.P Gonçalves and M.R McCarter and C Klewe and K.X Nguyen and F Gómez-Ortiz and P Shafer and E Arenholz and V.A Stoica and S.-L Hsu and B Wang and C Ophus and J.F Liu and C.T Nelson and S Saremi and B Prasad and A.B Mei and D.G Schlom and J Íñiguez and P García-Fernández and D.A Muller and L.Q Chen and J Junquera and L.W Martin and Ramamoorthy Ramesh},
  title = {Observation of room-temperature polar skyrmions},
  abstract = {Complex topological configurations are fertile ground for exploring emergent phenomena and exotic phases in condensed-matter physics. For example, the recent discovery of polarization vortices and their associated complex-phase coexistence and response under applied electric fields in superlattices of (PbTiO3)n/(SrTiO3)n suggests the presence of a complex, multi-dimensional system capable of interesting physical responses, such as chirality, negative capacitance and large piezo-electric responses1–3. Here, by varying epitaxial constraints, we discover room-temperature polar-skyrmion bubbles in a lead titanate layer confined by strontium titanate layers, which are imaged by atomic-resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy. Phase-field modelling and second-principles calculations reveal that the polar-skyrmion bubbles have a skyrmion number of +1, and resonant soft-X-ray diffraction experiments show circular dichroism, confirming chirality. Such nanometre-scale polar-skyrmion bubbles are the electric analogues of magnetic skyrmions, and could contribute to the advancement of ferroelectrics towards functionalities incorporating emergent chirality and electrically controllable negative capacitance. © 2019, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.},
  year = {2019},
  journal = {Nature},
  volume = {568},
  number = {7752},
  pages = {368-372},
  publisher = {Nature Publishing Group},
  issn = {00280836},
  doi = {10.1038/s41586-019-1092-8},
  note = {cited By 31},
  language = {eng},
}