Control of vortex chirality in regular polygonal nanomagnets using in-plane magnetic field

The authors have proposed a control method of the magnetic vortex chirality in regular polygonal nanomagnets with an odd number of sides. The asymmetric nucleation energy of the vortex from the uniformly magnetized state enables us to simply control the vortex chirality by an in-plane magnetic field. The reliability of the proposed method has been numerically and experimentally confirmed in the triangle, pentagonal, heptagonal, and nonagonal Permalloy nanomagnets. The authors also confirmed that the vortex chirality is uncontrollable when the number of the side is even. c 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3521407]