{"id":245345,"date":"2026-10-14T01:52:28","date_gmt":"2026-10-14T06:52:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/10\/optical-skyrmions-can-control-the-motion-of-magnetic-skyrmions"},"modified":"2026-10-14T01:52:28","modified_gmt":"2026-10-14T06:52:28","slug":"optical-skyrmions-can-control-the-motion-of-magnetic-skyrmions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/10\/optical-skyrmions-can-control-the-motion-of-magnetic-skyrmions","title":{"rendered":"Optical skyrmions can control the motion of magnetic skyrmions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/optical-skyrmions-can-control-the-motion-of-magnetic-skyrmions2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Magnetic skyrmions (MSks) are swirling patterns of magnetization that form inside certain magnetic materials. They can behave like actual particles in many ways, exhibiting a stable internal structure and distinct boundaries. Because they are extremely small and can be pushed around with relatively little energy, MSks are regarded as promising information carriers in emerging technologies, including low-power memories and logic circuits. However, a major goal in the field has been to find practical ways to control their motion with high precision.<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, MSks have a counterpart in light called optical skyrmions (OSks). These are structured polarization textures of electromagnetic fields that share the same underlying topological description as MSks. Despite their common topology, the two have been largely studied separately in their respective fields of magnetism and photonics. This raises a fundamental question: Can the topology of light control the dynamics of a MSk?<\/p>\n<p>A research team led by professor Masahito Mochizuki in the Department of Applied Physics at Waseda University, Japan, and Dr. Lan Bo, a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) postdoctoral fellow at Waseda University, attempted to fill the knowledge gap using micromagnetic simulations. Their study, co-authored by Dr. Xichao Zhang, a former research associate professor at Waseda University, was published online in the journal <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1103\/hylp-trxp\" target=\"_blank\"><i>Physical Review Letters<\/i><\/a> on Sept. 14, 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Magnetic skyrmions (MSks) are swirling patterns of magnetization that form inside certain magnetic materials. They can behave like actual particles in many ways, exhibiting a stable internal structure and distinct boundaries. Because they are extremely small and can be pushed around with relatively little energy, MSks are regarded as promising information carriers in emerging technologies, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1635,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-245345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-materials","category-particle-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245345"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245345\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}