We consider long and narrow spin valves composed of a first magnetic layer with a single domain wall (DW), a normal metal spacer and a second magnetic layer that is a planar or a perpendicular polarizer. For these structures, we study numerically DW dynamics taking into account the spin torques due to the perpendicular spin currents. We obtain high DW velocities: 50 m/s for planar polarizer and 640 m/s for perpendicular polarizer for J = 5*10^6 A/cm^2. These values are much larger than those predicted and observed for DW motion due to the in-plane spin currents. The ratio of the magnitudes of the torques, which generate the DW motion in the respective cases, is responsible for these large differences.
We report on reversible electric-field-driven magnetic domain wall motion in a Cu/Ni multilayer on a ferroelectric BaTiO$_3$ substrate. In our heterostructure, strain-coupling to ferroelastic domains with in-plane and perpendicular polarization in the BaTiO$_3$ substrate causes the formation of domains with perpendicular and in-plane magnetic anisotropy, respectively, in the Cu/Ni multilayer. Walls that separate magnetic domains are elastically pinned onto ferroelectric domain walls. Using magneto-optical Kerr effect microscopy, we demonstrate that out-of-plane electric field pulses across the…
We study domain wall (DW) dynamics in permalloy nanowires excited by alternating spin-polarized current applied perpendicular to the nanowire. Spin torque ferromagnetic resonance measurements reveal that DW oscillations at a pinning site in the nanowire can be excited with velocities as high as 800 m/s at current densities below 10$^7$ A/cm$^2$.
Domain wall motion induced by nanosecond current pulses in nanostripes with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (Pt/Co/AlO$_x$) is shown to exhibit negligible inertia. Time-resolved magnetic microscopy during current pulses reveals that the domain walls start moving, with a constant speed, as soon as the current reaches a constant amplitude, and no or little motion takes place after the end of the pulse. The very low 'mass' of these domain walls is attributed to the combination of their narrow width and high damping parameter $α$. Such a small inertia should allow accurate control of domain wall…
We combine magneto-optical imaging and a magnetic field pulse technique to study domain wall dynamics in a ferromagnetic (Ga,Mn)As layer with perpendicular easy axis. Contrary to ultrathin metallic layers, the depinning field is found to be smaller than the Walker field, thereby allowing for the observation of the steady and precessional flow regimes. The domain wall width and damping parameters are determined self-consistently. The damping, 30 times larger than the one deduced from ferromagnetic resonance, is shown to essentially originate from the non-conservation of the magnetization modulu…
Next-generation concepts for solid-state memory devices are based on current-driven domain wall propagation, where the wall velocity governs the device performance. It has been shown that the domain wall velocity and the direction of travel is controlled by the nature of the wall and its chirality. This chirality is attributed to effects emerging from the lack of inversion symmetry at the interface between a ferromagnet and a heavy metal, leading to an interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction that can control the shape and chirality of the magnetic domain wall. Here we present direct imag…
We report on magnetic domain wall velocity measurements in ultrathin Pt/Co(0.5-0.8 nm)/Pt films with perpendicular anisotropy over a large range of applied magnetic fields. The complete velocity-field characteristics are obtained, enabling an examination of the transition between thermally activated creep and viscous flow: motion regimes predicted from general theories for driven elastic interfaces in weakly disordered media. The dissipation limited flow regime is found to be consistent with precessional domain wall motion, analysis of which yields values for the damping parameter, $α$.
The dynamics of magnetic domain walls along ferromagnetic strips with spatially modulated perpendicular magnetic anisotropy is theoretically studied by means of micromagnetic simulations. Ferromagnetic layers with a periodic sawtooth profile of the anisotropy depict a well-defined set of energy minima where the walls are pinned in the absence of external stimuli, and favor the unidirectional propagation of domain walls. The performance of the current-driven domain wall motion along these ratchet-like systems is compared to the field-driven case. Our study indicates that the current-driven doma…
We study thermally assisted domain wall generation in perpendicular magnetic anisotropy CoFeB trilayer nanowires by the effect of Joule heating. The anomalous Hall effect is utilized to detect magnetization reversal in order to study the domain wall generation. We observe a statistical distribution in the switching process which is consistent with the thermal activation process. Our results show that the proposed method provides an efficient way for generating domain walls in perpendicular magnetic nanowires at predefined locations.
We study theoretically the current-induced magnetic domain wall motion in a metallic nanowire with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. The anisotropy can reduce the critical current density of the domain wall motion. We explain the reduction mechanism and identify the maximal reduction conditions. This result facilitates both fundamental studies and device applications of the current- induced domain wall motion.
By submonolayer insertion of Au, Pt, or Pd into Ta / CoFeB / MgO / Ta heterostructures we tune the perpendicular magnetic anisotropy and the coercive field of the ferromagnetic layer. We demonstrate that this has a major influence on the spin Hall switching current density and its dependence on the external magnetic field. Despite a rather small effective spin Hall angle of $θ_\mathrm{SH} \approx -0.07$, we obtain switching current densities as low as $2 \times 10^{10}$ A/m$^2$ with a 2 Å Au interlayer. We find that the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction parameter $D$ is reduced with Au or Pd i…
A study of transverse tail-to-tail magnetic domain walls (DW) in novel current perpendicular to the plane (CPP) spin valves (SV) of various dimensions is presented. For films with dimensions larger than the DW width, we find that DW motion can give rise to a substantial low frequency noise. For dimensions comparable to the DW width, we show that the DW can be controlled by an external field or by a spin momentum torque as opposed to the case of CPP-SV with uniform magnetization. It is shown that in a single domain biased CPP-SV, the spin torque can give rise to 1/f-type noise. The dipolar fiel…
Domain structures in CoFeB-MgO thin films with a perpendicular easy magnetization axis were observed by magneto-optic Kerr-effect microscopy at various temperatures. The domain wall surface energy was obtained by analyzing the spatial period of the stripe domains and fitting established domain models to the period. In combination with SQUID measurements of magnetization and anisotropy energy, this leads to an estimate of the exchange stiffness and domain wall width in these films. These parameters are essential for determining whether domain walls will form in patterned structures and devices …
Antiferromagnetic (AF) domain walls have recently attracted revived attention, not only in the emerging field of AF spintronics, but also more specifically for offering fast domain wall velocities and dynamic excitations up to the terahertz frequency regime. Here we introduce an approach to nucleate and stabilize an AF domain wall in a synthetic antiferromagnet (SAF). We present experimental and micromagnetic studies of the magnetization reversal in [(Co/Pt)$_{X-1}$/Co/Ir]$_{N-1}$(Co/Pt)$_X$ SAFs, where interface induced perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) and AF interlayer exchange coupli…
We have investigated the domain wall resistance for two types of domain walls in a (Ga,Mn)As Hall bar with perpendicular magnetization. A sizeable positive intrinsic DWR is inferred for domain walls that are pinned at an etching step, which is quite consistent with earlier observations. However, much lower intrinsic domain wall resistance is obtained when domain walls are formed by pinning lines in unetched material. This indicates that the spin transport across a domain wall is strongly influenced by the nature of the pinning.
The shape instability of magnetic domain walls under current is investigated in a ferromagnetic (Ga,Mn)(As,P) film with perpendicular anisotropy. Domain wall motion is driven by the spin transfer torque mechanism. A current density gradient is found either to stabilize domains with walls perpendicular to current lines or to produce finger-like patterns, depending on the domain wall motion direction. The instability mechanism is shown to result from the non-adiabatic contribution of the spin transfer torque mechanism.
We report the direct observation of the current-driven domain wall (DW) motion by magnetic force microscopy in a structured Co/Ni wire with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. The wire has notches to define the DW position. It is demonstrated that single current pulses can precisely control the DW position from notch to notch with high DW velocity of 40 m/s.
We report the results of micromagnetic simulations of domain wall (DW) nucleation and pinning/depinning processes in ferromagnetic planar structure consisting of nanowire (NW) with perpendicular anisotropy and special V-shaped nanoparticle (NP) with in-plane anisotropy located on top of NW. The magnetization reversal features of this system in an external magnetic field are investigated depending on the direction of particle magnetic moment. Possible variants of magnetic logic cells (LCs) based on such system are discussed.
The use of epitaxial layers for domain wall-based spintronic applications is often hampered by the presence of pinning sites. Here, we show that when depositing Mn4N(10 nm) epitaxial films, the replacement of MgO(001) by SrTiO3(001) substrates allows minimizing the misfit, and to obtain an improved crystalline quality, a sharper switching, a full remanence, a high anisotropy and remarkable millimeter-sized magnetic domains, with straight and smooth domain walls. In a context of rising interest for current-induced domain wall motion in rare
Spin-orbit torques, which utilize spin currents arising from the spin-orbit coupling, offer a novel method to electrically switch the magnetization with perpendicular anisotropy. However, the necessity of an external magnetic field to achieve a deterministic switching is an obstacle for realizing practical spin-orbit torque devices with all-electric operation. Here, we report a field-free spin-orbit torque switching by exploiting the domain wall motion in an anti-notched microwire with perpendicular anisotropy, which exhibits multi-domain states stabilized by the domain wall surface tension. T…
Perpendicular magnetic anisotropy [Co/Pd]15 and L10-FePt nanowire arrays of period 63 nm with linewidths 38 nm and 27 nm and film thickness 27 nm and 20 nm respectively were fabricated using a self-assembled PS-b-PDMS diblock copolymer film as a lithographic mask. The wires are predicted to support Neel walls in the Co/Pd and Bloch walls in the FePt. Magnetostatic interactions from nearest neighbor nanowires promote a ground state configuration consisting of alternating up and down magnetization in adjacent wires. This was observed over ~75% of the Co/Pd wires after ac-demagnetization but was …
A theory for the spin wave eigenmodes of a Dzyaloshinskii domain wall is presented. These walls are Néel-type domain walls that can appear in perpendicularly-magnetized ultrathin ferromagnets in the presence of a sizeable Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. The mode frequencies for spin waves propagating parallel and perpendicular to the domain wall are computed using a continuum approximation. In contrast to Bloch-type walls, it is found that the spin wave potential associated with Dzyaloshinskii domain walls is not reflectionless, which leads to a finite scattering cross-section for interacti…
We report the observation of the antisymmetric magnetoresistance (MR) in perpendicular magnetized CoTb films with inhomogeneous magnetization distribution driven by gradient magnetic field. By synchronously charactering the domain pattern evolution during transport measurements, we demonstrate that the nonequilibrium currents in the vicinity of tilting domain walls give rise to such anomalous MR. Moreover, theoretical calculation and analysis reveal that the geometry factor of the multidomain texture plays a dominant role in generating the nonequilibrium current. The explicitly established int…
The perpendicular magnetic anisotropy K$_e$$_f$$_f$, magnetization reversal, and field-driven domain wall velocity in the creep regime are modified in Pt/Co(0.85-1.0 nm)/Pt thin films by strain applied via piezoelectric transducers. K$_e$$_f$$_f$, measured by the extraordinary Hall effect, is reduced by 10 kJ/m$^3$ by tensile strain out-of-plane ε$_z$ = 9 x 10-4, independently of the film thickness, indicating a dominant volume contribution to the magnetostriction. The same strain reduces the coercive field by 2-4 Oe, and increases the domain wall velocity measured by wide-field Kerr microscop…
We present an analytical theory to describe three-dimensional magnetic textures in perpendicularly magnetized magnetic multilayers that arise in the presence of magnetostatic interactions and the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI). We demonstrate that domain walls in multilayers develop a complex twisted structure, which persists even for films with strong DMI. The origin of this twist is surface-volume stray field interactions that manifest as a depth-dependent effective field whose form mimics the DMI effective field. We find that the wall twist has a minor impact on the equilibrium sky…
It is known that oscillatory domain-wall (DW) motions in soft magnetic thin-film nanostripes above the Walker critical field lead to a remarkable reduction in the average DW velocities. In a much-higher-field region beyond the velocity-breakdown regime, however, the DW velocities have been found to increase in response to a further increase of the applied field. We report on the physical origin and detailed mechanism of this unexpected behavior. We associate the mechanism with the serial dynamic processes of the nucleation of vortex-antivortex (V-AV) pairs inside the stripe or at its edges, th…
It has been shown previously that the presence of a Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction in perpendicularly magnetized thin films stabilizes Néel type domain walls. We demonstrate, using micromagnetic simulations and analytical modeling, that the presence of a uniaxial in-plane magnetic anisotropy can also lead to the formation of Néel walls in the absence of a Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. It is possible to abruptly switch between Bloch and Néel walls via a small modulation of both the in-plane, but also the perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. This opens up a route towards electric field con…
Stripe width variation in ultrathin magnetic films is a well known phenomenon still not well understood. We analyze this problem considering a 2D Heisenberg model with ferromagnetic exchange interactions, dipolar interactions and perpendicular anisotropy, relevant e.g. in Fe/Cu(001) films. By extending a classic result of Yafet & Gyorgy (YG) and using Monte Carlo simulations we calculate the complete zero temperature phase diagram of the model. Through this calculation we analyze the correlation between domain walls structure and stripe width variation, as the perpendicular anisotropy changes.…
We investigate the motion of magnetic domain walls driven by magnetic fields and current-driven spin-orbit torques in an exchange-biased system with perpendicular magnetization. We consider Cr2O3/Co/Pt trilayers as model system, in which the magnetization of the Co layer can be exchanged-biased out-of-plane or in-plane depending on the field cooling direction. In field-driven experiments, the in-plane exchange bias favors the propagation of the domain walls with internal magnetization parallel to the exchange bias field. In current-driven experiments, the domain walls propagate along the curre…
We exploit the ability to precisely control the magnetic domain structure of perpendicularly magnetized Pt/Co/Pt trilayers to fabricate artificial domain wall arrays and study their transport properties. The scaling behaviour of this model system confirms the intrinsic domain wall origin of the magnetoresistance, and systematic studies using domains patterned at various angles to the current flow are excellently described by an angular-dependent resistivity tensor containing perpendicular and parallel domain wall resistivities. We find that the latter are fully consistent with Levy-Zhang theor…
We study morphologies of thin-film diblock copolymers between two flat and parallel walls. The study is restricted to the weak segregation regime below the order-disorder transition temperature. The deviation from perfect lamellar shape is calculated for phases which are perpendicular and parallel to the walls. We examine the undulations of the inter material dividing surface and its angle with the walls, and find that the deviation from its unperturbed position can be much larger than in the strong segregation case. Evaluating the weak segregation stability of the lamellar phases, it is shown…
Compensated ferrimagnets are promising materials for fast spintronic applications based on domain wall motion as they combine the favourable properties of ferromagnets and antiferromagnets. They inherit from antiferromagnets immunity to external fields, fast spin dynamics and rapid domain wall motion. From ferromagnets they inherit straightforward ways to read out the magnetic state, especially in compensated half metals, where electrons flow in only one spin channel. Here, we investigate domain structure in compensated half-metallic Mn2Ru0.5Ga films and assess their potential in domain wall m…
We use time-resolved measurement and modeling to study the spin-torque induced motion of a domain wall in perpendicular anisotropy magnets. In disc of diameters between 70 and 100 nm, the wall drifts across the disc with pronounced back-and-forth oscillations that arise because the wall moves in the Walker regime. Several switching paths occur stochastically and lead to distinct switching durations. The wall can cross the disc center either in a ballistic manner or with variably marked oscillations before and after the crossing. The crossing of the center can even occur multiple times if a ver…
The dynamics of domain walls in ultrathin ferromagnetic strips with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy is studied from both numerical and analytical micromagnetics. The influence of the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction associated to a bi-layer strip arrangement has been considered, giving rise to the formation of Dzyaloshinskii domain walls. Such walls possess under equilibrium conditions an inner magnetization structure defined by a certain orientation angle that make them to be considered as intermediate configurations between Bloch and Néel walls. Two different dynamics are cons…
Magnetic nanowires supporting field- and current-driven domain wall motion are envisioned for new methods of information storage and processing. A major obstacle for their practical use is the domainwall velocity, which is traditionally limited due to the Walker breakdown occurring when the forcing field or current reaches a critical threshold value. We show through numerical and analytical modeling that the Walker breakdown limit can be extended or completely eliminated in antiferromagnetically coupled magnetic nanowires. These coupled nanowires allow for giant domain-wall velocities driven b…
We present an analytical model for calculating energy barrier for the magnetic field-driven domain wall-mediated magnetization reversal of a magneto-resistive random access memory (MRAM) cell and apply it to study thermal stability factor $Δ$ for various thicknesses of W layers inserted into the free layer (FL) as a function of the cell size and temperature. We find that, by increasing W thickness, the effective perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) energy density of the FL film monotonically increases, but at the same time, $Δ$ of the cell mainly decreases. Our analysis shows that, in addit…
Perpendicularly magnetized materials have attracted tremendous interest due to their high anisotropy, which results in extremely narrow, nano-sized domain walls. As a result, the recently studied current-induced domain wall motion (CIDWM) in these materials promises to enable a novel class of data, memory, and logic devices. In this letter, we propose the spin Hall effect as a radically new mechanism for CIDWM. We are able to carefully tune the net spin Hall current in depinning experiments on Pt/Co/Pt nanowires, offering unique control over CIDWM. Furthermore, we determine that the depinning …
We present a method to map the saturation magnetization of soft ultrathin films with perpendicular anisotropy, and we illustrate it to assess the compositional dependence of the magnetization of CoFeB(1 nm)/MgO films. The method relies on the measurement of the dipolar repulsion of parallel domain walls that define a linear domain. The film magnetization is linked to the field compressibility of the domain. The method also yields the minimal distance between two walls before their merging, which sets a practical limit to the storage density in spintronic devices using domain walls as storage e…
Ferroelectric domain wall motion is fundamental to the switching properties of ferroelectric devices and is influenced by a wide range of factors including spatial disorder within the material and thermal noise. We build a Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire (LGD) model of 180${}^{\circ}$ ferroelectric domain wall motion that explicitly takes into account the presence of both spatial and temporal disorder. We demonstrate both creep flow and linear flow regimes of the domain wall dynamics by solving the LGD equations in a Galilean frame moving with the wall velocity $v$. Thermal noise plays a key role i…
Current induced domain wall (DW) motion has been investigated in a 600-nm wide nanowire using multilayer film with a structure of Ta(5 nm)/Pd(5 nm)/[CoFe(0.4 nm)/Pd(1.2 nm)]$_{15}$/Ta(5 nm)in terms of anomalous Hall effect measurements. It is found that motion of DWs can be driven by a current density as low as 1.44$\times$10$^{11}$ A.m$^{-2}$. The effect of the Oersted field ($H_{Oe}$) and spin transfer torque field ($H_{ST}$), which are considered as effective fields for DW motion, has been quantitatively separated from the dependence of depinning fields on the current. The results show that…
Spin-transfer torque (STT) and spin-orbit torque (SOT) are spintronic phenomena allowing magnetization manipulation using electrical currents. Beyond their fundamental interest, they allow developing new classes of magnetic memories and logic devices, in particular based on domain wall (DW) motion. In this work, we report the study of STT driven DW motion in ferrimagnetic manganese nickel nitride (Mn4-xNixN) films, in which a fine adjustment of the Ni content allows setting the magnetic compensation at room temperature. The reduced magnetization, combined with the large spin polarization of co…
We report on the controlled switching of domain wall (DW) magnetization in aligned stripe domain structures, stabilized in [Co (0.44 nm)/Pt (0.7 nm)]$_X$ ($X = 48$, 100, 150) multilayers with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. The switching process, induced by an external magnetic field, is monitored by measuring the evolution of the in-plane magnetization. % We show that the remanent in-plane magnetization originates from the polarization of the Bloch-type DWs. With micromagnetic simulations, we reveal that the reversal of the DW polarization is the result of the emergence and collapse of hor…
The incorporation of Phosphorus into (Ga,Mn)As epilayers allows for the tuning of the magnetic easy axis from in-plane to perpendicular-to-plane without the need for a (Ga,In)As template. For perpendicular easy axis, using magneto-optical imaging a self-organized pattern of up- and down-magnetized domains is observed for the first time in a diluted magnetic semiconductor. Combining Kerr microscopy, magnetometry and ferromagnetic resonance spectroscopy, the exchange constant and the domain wall width parameter are obtained as a function of temperature. The former quantifies the effective Mn-Mn …
A model is studied for the theoretical description of nanoscale magnetic films with high perpendicular anisotropy. In the model the magnetic film is described in terms of single domain magnetic grains with Ising-like behavior, interacting via exchange as well as via dipolar forces. Additionally, the model contains an energy barrier and a coupling to an external magnetic field. Disorder is taken into account in order to describe realistic domain and domain wall structures. The influence of a finite temperature as well as the dynamics can be modeled by a Monte Carlo simulation. Many of the exper…
Electric field effects in ferromagnetic/oxide dielectric structures provide a new route to control domain wall (DW) dynamics with low power dissipation. However, electric field effects on DW velocities have only been observed so far in the creep regime where DW velocities are low due to strong interactions with pinning sites. Here, we show gate voltage modulation of DW velocities ranging from the creep to the flow regime in Ta/Co40Fe40B20/MgO/TiO2 structures with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. We demonstrate a universal description of the role of applied electric fields in the various pinn…
We investigate the correlation between roughness, remanence and coercivity in Co/Ni films grown on Cu seed layers of varying thickness. Increasing the Cu seed layer thickness of Ta/Cu/8x[Co/Ni] thin films increases the roughness of the films. In-plane magnetization loops show that both the remanance and coercivity increase with increasing seed layer roughness. Polar Kerr microscopy and magnetic force microscopy reveal that the domain density also increases with roughness. Finite element micromagnetic simulations performed on structures with periodically modulated surfaces provide further insig…
We characterize asymmetric growth of magnetic bubble domains in perpendicularly magnetized Co/Ni multi-layers grown on Pt$_x$Ir$_{1-x}$ seedlayers by application of perpendicular and in-plane magnetic fields. Using a refined model of domain wall creep that incorporates contributions from the anisotropic elastic energy, $\varepsilon$, and a chirality-dependent prefactor, $v_0$, we elucidate factors that govern the mobility of Dzyaloshinskii domain walls as a function of seedlayer composition. The interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya Interaction magnitude is found to decrease monotonically with $x_…
We experimentally investigate the current-induced magnetization reversal in Pt/[Co/Ni]$_3$/Al multilayers combining the anomalous Hall effect and magneto-optical Kerr effect techniques in crossbar geometry. The magnetization reversal occurs through nucleation and propagation of a domain of opposite polarity for a current density of the order of 0.3 TA/m$^2$. In these experiments we demonstrate a full control of each stage: i)the Ørsted field controls the domain nucleation and ii) domain-wall propagation occurs by spin torque from the Pt spin Hall effect. This scenario requires an in-plane magn…
The ferromagnetism of a thin GaMnAs layer with a perpendicular easy anisotropy axis is investigated by means of several techniques, that yield a consistent set of data on the magnetic properties and the domain structure of this diluted ferromagnetic semiconductor. The magnetic layer was grown under tensile strain on a relaxed GaInAs buffer layer using a procedure that limits the density of threading dislocations. Magnetometry, magneto-transport and polar magneto-optical Kerr effect (PMOKE) measurements reveal the high quality of this layer, in particular through its high Curie temperature (130…
We investigate the Gilbert damping and the magnetization switching of perpendicularly magnetized FeCoB-based free layers embedded in tunnel junctions adequate for spin-torque operated memories. We study the influence of the boron content in MgO / FeCoB /Ta systems alloys on their Gilbert damping after crystallization annealing. Increasing the boron content from 20 to 30\% increases the crystallization temperature, thereby postponing the onset of elemental diffusion within the free layer. This reduction of the interdiffusion of the Ta atoms helps maintaining the Gilbert damping at a low level o…
Current-induced domain-wall motion with velocity spanning over five orders of magnitude up to 22 m/s has been observed by magneto-optical Kerr effect in (Ga,Mn)As with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. The data are employed to verify theories of spin-transfer by the Slonczewski-like mechanism as well as by the torque resulting from spin-flip transitions in the domain-wall region. Evidence for domain-wall creep at low currents is found.
The electrical resistance of magnetic domain walls in ferromagnetic metallic manganites can be enhanced to 10-12 Ohm.m2 by patterning nanoconstrictions [J. Appl. Phys. 89, 6955 (2001)]. We show equally large enhancements in a phase separated La0.60Ca0.40MnO3 manganite film without recourse to nanopatterning. The domain walls were measured in the current-perpendicular-to-the-plane (CPP) geometry between ferromagnetic metallic La0.70Ca0.30MnO3 electrodes patterned like magnetic tunnel junctions.
We present a theoretical analysis of recent experimental measurements of magnetoresistance in (Ga,Mn)As epilayers with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. The model reproduces the field-antisymmetric anomalies observed in the longitudinal magnetoresistance in the planar geometry (magnetic field in the epilayer plane and parallel to the current density), as well as the unusual shape of the accompanying transverse magnetoresistance. The magnetoresistance characteristics are attributed to circulating currents created by the presence of magnetic domain walls.
In our numerical study, we identify the best conditions for efficient domain wall motion by spin-orbit torques originating from the Spin Hall effect or Rashba effect. We demonstrate that the effect depends critically on the domain wall configuration, the current injection scheme and the symmetry of the spin-orbit torque. The best identified configuration corresponds to a Néel wall driven by spin Hall Effect in a narrow strip with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. In this case, the domain wall velocity can be a factor of 10 larger than that for the conventional current-in-plane spin-transfer t…
A series of microstructures designed to pin domain-walls (DWs) in (Ga,Mn)As with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy has been employed to determine extrinsic and intrinsic contributions to DW resistance. The former is explained quantitatively as resulting from a polarity change in the Hall electric field at DW. The latter is one order of magnitude greater than a term brought about by anisotropic magnetoresistance and is shown to be consistent with disorder-induced misstracing of the carrier spins subject to spatially varying magnetization.
In a thin magnetic nanostripe, an anti-vortex nucleates inside a moving domain wall when driven by an in-plane magnetic field greater than the so-called Walker field. The nucleated anti-vortex must cross the width of the nanostripe before the domain wall can propagate again, leading to low average domain wall speeds. A large out-of-plane magnetic field, applied perpendicularly to the plane of the nanostripe, inhibits the nucleation of the anti-vortex leading to fast domain wall speeds for all in-plane driving fields. We present micromagnetic simulation results relating the anti-vortex dynamics…
Observation of large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy and excessive polar magneto-optical effect in Pt/CoFeB/Ru tri-layer system
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur（坎普尔印度理工学院）；UGC-DAE Consortium for Scientific Research（UGC-DAE科学研究联盟）；Forschungszentrum Jülich（于利希研究中心）；Kyushu Institute of Technology（九州工业大学）
We present a micromagnetic study of the current-induced domain wall motion in perpendicularly magnetized Pt/Co/AlOx racetracks. We show that the domain wall velocity depends critically on the tilt angle of the wall relative to the current direction, which is determined by the combined action of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, damping-like, and field-like spin-orbit torques. The asymmetry of the domain wall velocity can be controlled by applying a bias-field perpendicular to the current direction as well as by the current amplitude. As the faster domain walls are expelled rapidly from th…
