The control of the domain patterns in systems with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) is of great interest because of their applications on magnetic storage or spintronic devices. Amorphous Tb-Fe alloys exhibit a pretty large PMA constant that reachs 106 J/m3. Recently, it has been reported a constant of at least 1×105 J/m3 in TbFeGa alloys [1]. We have deposited TbFeGa films by cosputtering using two targets with a composition of TbFe2 and Fe3Ga. Two series of samples were obtained by applying a different type of power source (DC or pulsed) in each target. The evaporation of TbFe2 by means of the DC source enhances the out of plane component of the magnetization. The results indicate that this can be due to the Tb enrichment of the TbFe2-based phases present in the alloys. Magnetic force microscopy (MFM), which shows the presence of stripe domains, has been used to investigate the rotatable anisotropy of these films. A magnetic field of variable intensity placed at 90 degrees with respect to the stripes direction has been applied, while in-field MFM images were recorded. The results clearly show the correlation between OOP and rotatable anisotropies, which allows to tailor the magnetic domain patterns by changing the films preparation conditions.
TAILORING THE MAGNETIC DOMAIN PATTERNS AND MAGNETIC ANISOTROPY OF SPUTTERED TbFeGa ALLOYS
FIN, Samuele;BISERO, Diego
2013
Abstract
The control of the domain patterns in systems with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) is of great interest because of their applications on magnetic storage or spintronic devices. Amorphous Tb-Fe alloys exhibit a pretty large PMA constant that reachs 106 J/m3. Recently, it has been reported a constant of at least 1×105 J/m3 in TbFeGa alloys [1]. We have deposited TbFeGa films by cosputtering using two targets with a composition of TbFe2 and Fe3Ga. Two series of samples were obtained by applying a different type of power source (DC or pulsed) in each target. The evaporation of TbFe2 by means of the DC source enhances the out of plane component of the magnetization. The results indicate that this can be due to the Tb enrichment of the TbFe2-based phases present in the alloys. Magnetic force microscopy (MFM), which shows the presence of stripe domains, has been used to investigate the rotatable anisotropy of these films. A magnetic field of variable intensity placed at 90 degrees with respect to the stripes direction has been applied, while in-field MFM images were recorded. The results clearly show the correlation between OOP and rotatable anisotropies, which allows to tailor the magnetic domain patterns by changing the films preparation conditions.I documenti in SFERA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
