  Short electron pulses are demonstrated to trigger and control magnetic
excitations, even at low electron current densities.
  We show that the tangential magnetic field surrounding a picosecond electron
pulse can imprint topologically protected magnetic textures such as skyrmions
in a sample with a residual Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya spin-orbital coupling.
Characteristics of the created excitations such as the topological charge can
be steered via the duration and the strength of the electron pulses. The study
points to a possible way for a spatio-temporally controlled generation of
skyrmionic excitations.
