Magnetic nanovortices, so-called “skyrmions”, count among the most promising candidates for the future of information technology. Processors and storage media making use of these tiny structures could one day lead to the further miniaturization of IT devices and improve their energy efficiency significantly. Materials possessing suitable vortices can be identified in particular by their topological charge, an essential characteristic of skyrmions. To determine this property experimentally has up to now been a very laborious process. Physicists from Jülich have now put forward a simpler method which could speed up the screening of suitable materials, using X-rays.