Direct Observation of Domain-Wall Surface Tension by Deflating or Inflating a Magnetic Bubble

The surface energy of a magnetic Domain Wall (DW) strongly affects its static and dynamic behaviours. However, this effect was seldom directly observed and many related phenomena have not been well understood. Moreover, a reliable method to quantify the DW surface energy is still missing. Here, we report a series of experiments in which the DW surface energy becomes a dominant parameter. We observed that a semicircular magnetic domain bubble could spontaneously collapse under the Laplace pressure induced by DW surface energy. We further demonstrated that the surface energy could lead to a geometrically induced pinning when the DW propagates in a Hall cross or from a nanowire into a nucleation pad. Based on these observations, we developed two methods to quantify the DW surface energy, which could be very helpful to estimate intrinsic parameters such as Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya Interactions (DMI) or exchange stiffness in magnetic ultra-thin films.