Fourfold magnetic anisotropy varied by interfacial exchange coupling in epitaxial Fe/IrMn bilayers

Xinwei Feng; Yangping Wang; Jing Meng; Haoyu Lin; Xiaoyan Zhu; Yali Xie; Dongmei Jiang; Yang Xu; Tian Shang; Qingfeng Zhan

doi:10.1063/5.0168554

Fourfold magnetic anisotropy varied by interfacial exchange coupling in epitaxial Fe/IrMn bilayers

Xinwei Feng, Yangping Wang, Jing Meng, Haoyu Lin, Xiaoyan Zhu, Yali Xie, Dongmei Jiang, Yang Xu, Tian Shang, Qingfeng Zhan

School of Physics and Electronic Science

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

We report variable in-plane fourfold magnetic anisotropy in epitaxial exchange-biased Fe/IrMn bilayers with different layer thicknesses. The fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers continuously decreases and even appears negative as the thickness of the Fe layer decreases, indicating a change in the easy axes from Fe 100 to Fe 110 , which can be interpreted by the competition between the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy along Fe 100 and the extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy along Fe 110 induced by the interfacial exchange coupling to IrMn. As the IrMn thickness increases, the fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers decreases rapidly from a value close to the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy of Fe and then gradually reaches saturation. The extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy depends on the amount of the induced uncompensated IrMn spins near the edge of antiferromagnetic domains. In contrast, the exchange bias is determined by the net difference of the opposite uncompensated IrMn spins.

Original language	English
Article number	122402
Journal	Applied Physics Letters
Volume	123
Issue number	12
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0168554
State	Published - 18 Sep 2023

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title = "Fourfold magnetic anisotropy varied by interfacial exchange coupling in epitaxial Fe/IrMn bilayers",

abstract = "We report variable in-plane fourfold magnetic anisotropy in epitaxial exchange-biased Fe/IrMn bilayers with different layer thicknesses. The fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers continuously decreases and even appears negative as the thickness of the Fe layer decreases, indicating a change in the easy axes from Fe 100 to Fe 110 , which can be interpreted by the competition between the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy along Fe 100 and the extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy along Fe 110 induced by the interfacial exchange coupling to IrMn. As the IrMn thickness increases, the fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers decreases rapidly from a value close to the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy of Fe and then gradually reaches saturation. The extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy depends on the amount of the induced uncompensated IrMn spins near the edge of antiferromagnetic domains. In contrast, the exchange bias is determined by the net difference of the opposite uncompensated IrMn spins.",

author = "Xinwei Feng and Yangping Wang and Jing Meng and Haoyu Lin and Xiaoyan Zhu and Yali Xie and Dongmei Jiang and Yang Xu and Tian Shang and Qingfeng Zhan",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2023 Author(s).",

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month = sep,

day = "18",

doi = "10.1063/5.0168554",

language = "英语",

volume = "123",

journal = "Applied Physics Letters",

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TY - JOUR

T1 - Fourfold magnetic anisotropy varied by interfacial exchange coupling in epitaxial Fe/IrMn bilayers

AU - Feng, Xinwei

AU - Wang, Yangping

AU - Meng, Jing

AU - Lin, Haoyu

AU - Zhu, Xiaoyan

AU - Xie, Yali

AU - Jiang, Dongmei

AU - Xu, Yang

AU - Shang, Tian

AU - Zhan, Qingfeng

PY - 2023/9/18

Y1 - 2023/9/18

N2 - We report variable in-plane fourfold magnetic anisotropy in epitaxial exchange-biased Fe/IrMn bilayers with different layer thicknesses. The fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers continuously decreases and even appears negative as the thickness of the Fe layer decreases, indicating a change in the easy axes from Fe 100 to Fe 110 , which can be interpreted by the competition between the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy along Fe 100 and the extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy along Fe 110 induced by the interfacial exchange coupling to IrMn. As the IrMn thickness increases, the fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers decreases rapidly from a value close to the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy of Fe and then gradually reaches saturation. The extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy depends on the amount of the induced uncompensated IrMn spins near the edge of antiferromagnetic domains. In contrast, the exchange bias is determined by the net difference of the opposite uncompensated IrMn spins.

AB - We report variable in-plane fourfold magnetic anisotropy in epitaxial exchange-biased Fe/IrMn bilayers with different layer thicknesses. The fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers continuously decreases and even appears negative as the thickness of the Fe layer decreases, indicating a change in the easy axes from Fe 100 to Fe 110 , which can be interpreted by the competition between the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy along Fe 100 and the extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy along Fe 110 induced by the interfacial exchange coupling to IrMn. As the IrMn thickness increases, the fourfold magnetic anisotropy of the bilayers decreases rapidly from a value close to the intrinsic magnetocrystalline anisotropy of Fe and then gradually reaches saturation. The extrinsic fourfold magnetic anisotropy depends on the amount of the induced uncompensated IrMn spins near the edge of antiferromagnetic domains. In contrast, the exchange bias is determined by the net difference of the opposite uncompensated IrMn spins.

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85172710910

U2 - 10.1063/5.0168554

DO - 10.1063/5.0168554

M3 - 文章

AN - SCOPUS:85172710910

SN - 0003-6951

VL - 123

JO - Applied Physics Letters

JF - Applied Physics Letters

IS - 12

M1 - 122402

ER -

Fourfold magnetic anisotropy varied by interfacial exchange coupling in epitaxial Fe/IrMn bilayers

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