Proximity Induced Non-collinear Magnetic States in Planar Superconductor/Ferromagnet Hybrids

The proximity induced superconducting (S) correlations in ferromagnetic (F) layers of planar S/F hybrids are shown to be responsible for the appearance of a nonlinear interaction between the magnetic moments of the F layers. This interaction originates from the combined influence of the orbital and exchange phenomena and can result in the spontaneous formation of non-collinear magnetic states in these systems. The proposed nonlinear coupling mechanism and resulting changes of magnetic textures are crucial for the design of the superconducting spintronics devices exploiting the long-range spin triplet proximity effect.