Abstract
A study on the buffer layer dependence of the film texture, surface roughness, and magnetization re-versal process in Co/Pt multilayers prepared by dc magnetron sputtering is presented. Oxidized Si(100) wafer was covered with four different buffers: (A) 10 nm Cu, (B) 5 nm Ta/10 nm Cu, (C) 5 nm Ta/10 nm Cu/5 nm Ta, and (D) 5 nm Ta/10 nm Cu/5 nm Ta/10 nm Cu. The growth of [2 nm Pt/0.5 nm Co]×5/2 nm Pt on top of these buffer layers results in a large variation in the fcc (111) Co/Pt texture and surface mor-phology. All films have the perpendicular magnetic anisotropy but magnetization reversal process, stud-ied by the magnetooptic Kerr effect (MOKE) and magnetic force spectroscopy (MFM), strongly depends on the buffer used. Observation of magnetic domains evolution under a MOKE microscope allows one to calculate from magnetization relaxation curves average dispersion of energy barriers of the thermal acti-vated magnetization switching process. The application of MFM in external magnetic field allows one to follow the dynamics of direct and indirect magnetization switching procesess up to submicrometer scale.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 839-849 |
Journal | Materials Science-Poland |
Volume | 26 |
Issue number | 4 |
Publication status | Published - 2008 |
MoE publication type | A1 Journal article-refereed |
Keywords
- magnetic domain
- magnetization reversal
- perpendicular anisotropy
- anisotropy
- magnetic anisotropy