No Arabic abstract
We present a study of the temperature dependence of the switching fields in Co/Ni-based perpendicularly magnetized spin-valves. While magnetization reversal of all-perpendicular Co/Ni spin valves at ambient temperatures is typically marked by a single sharp step change in resistance, low temperature measurements can reveal a series of resistance steps, consistent with non-uniform magnetization configurations. We propose a model that consists of domain nucleation, propagation and annihilation to explain the temperature dependence of the switching fields. Interestingly, low temperature (<30 K) step changes in resistance that we associate with domain nucleation, have a bimodal switching field and resistance step distribution, attributable to two competing nucleation pathways.
Perpendicularly magnetized nanowires exhibit distinct domain wall types depending on the geometry. Wide wires contain Bloch walls, narrow wires Neel walls. Here, the transition region is investigated by direct imaging of the wall structure using high-resolution spin-polarized scanning electron microscopy. An achiral intermediate wall type is discovered that is unpredicted by established theoretical models. With the help of micromagnetic simulations, the formation of this novel wall type is explained.
We report on the time-resolved investigation of current- and field-induced domain wall motion in perpendicularly magnetized microwires exhibiting asymmetric exchange interaction by means of scanning transmission x-ray microscopy using a time step of 200 ps. Dynamical domain wall velocities on the order of 50-100 m s$^{-1}$ were observed. The improvement in the temporal resolution allowed us to observe the absence of incubation times for the motion of the domain wall, together with indications for a negligible inertia. Furthermore, we observed that, for short current and magnetic field pulses, the magnetic domain walls do not exhibit a tilting during its motion, providing a mechanism for the fast, tilt-free, motion of magnetic domain walls.
Magnetic skyrmions are chiral spin structures that have recently been observed at room temperature (RT) in multilayer thin films. Their topological stability should enable high scalability in confined geometries - a sought-after attribute for device applications. While umpteen theoretical predictions have been made regarding the phenomenology of sub-100 nm skyrmions confined in dots, in practice their formation in the absence of an external magnetic field and evolution with confinement remain to be established. Here we demonstrate the confinement-induced stabilization of sub-100 nm RT skyrmions at zero field (ZF) in Ir/Fe(x)/Co(y)/Pt nanodots over a wide range of magnetic and geometric parameters. The ZF skyrmion size can be as small as ~50 nm, and varies by a factor of 4 with dot size and magnetic parameters. Crucially, skyrmions with varying thermodynamic stability exhibit markedly different confinement phenomenologies. These results establish a comprehensive foundation for skyrmion phenomenology in nanostructures, and provide immediate directions for exploiting their properties in nanoscale devices.
Magnetic skyrmions are nanometric spin textures of outstanding potential for spintronic applications due to unique features governed by their non-trivial topology. It is well known that skyrmions of definite chirality are stabilized by the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya exchange interaction (DMI) in bulk non-centrosimmetric materials or ultrathin films with strong spin-orbit coupling in the interface. In this work, we report on the detection of magnetic hedgehog-skyrmions at room temperature in confined systems with neither DMI nor perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. We show that soft magnetic (permalloy) nanodots are able to host non- chiral hedgehog skyrmions that can be further stabilized by the magnetic field arising from the Magnetic Force Microscopy probe. Analytical calculations and micromagnetic simulations confirmed the existence of metastable Neel skyrmions in permalloy nanodots even without external stimuli in a certain size range. Our work implies the existence of a new degree of freedom to create and manipulate skyrmions in soft nanodots. The stabilization of skyrmions in soft magnetic materials opens a possibility to study the skymion magnetization dynamics otherwise limited due to the large damping constant coming from the high spin-orbit coupling in materials with high magnetic anisotropy.
A perpendicularly magnetized ferromagnetic layer is an important building block for recent/future highdensity spintronic memory applications. This paper reports on the fabrication of perpendicularly magnetized Ni / Pt superlattices and the characterization of their structures and magnetic properties. The optimization of film growth conditions allowed us to grow epitaxial Ni / Pt (001) superlattices on SrTiO$_{3}$ (001) single crystal substrates. We investigated their structural parameters and magnetic properties as a function of the Ni layer thickness, and obtained a high uniaxial magnetic anisotropy energy of 1.9 x 10$^{6}$ erg/cm$^{3}$ for a [Ni (4.0 nm) / Pt (1.0 nm)] superlattice. In order to elucidate the detailed mechanism on perpendicular magnetic anisotropy for the Ni / Pt (001) superlattices, the experimental results were compared with the first-principles calculations. It has been found that the strain effect is a prime source of the emergence of perpendicular magnetic anisotropy.