Beating the Walker Limit with Massless Domain Walls in Cylindrical Nanowires

We present a micromagnetic study on the current-induced domain-wall motion in cylindrical Permalloy nanowires with diameters below 50 nm. The transverse domain walls forming in such thin, round wires are found to differ significantly from those known from flat nanostrips. In particular, we show that these domain walls are zero-mass micromagnetic objects. As a consequence, they display outstanding dynamic properties, most importantly the absence of a breakdown velocity generally known as the Walker limit. Our simulation data are confirmed by an analytic model which provides a detailed physical understanding. We further predict that a particular effect of the current-induced dynamics of these domain walls could be exploited to measure the nonadiabatic spin-transfer torque coefficient.