Micromagnetic investigation of all-optical switching

•The effects of laser exposure time and laser intensity on the stability of all-optical switching are analyzed.•The correlation between times involved into all-optical magnetization reversal is established.•The influence of cooling process on successive switches is analyzed.

This Letter investigates all-optical magnetization switching from micromagnetic perspective. The influence of circularly polarized light on a magnetic sample was considered to be both directly through the inverse Faraday effect and indirectly aided by thermal induced effects by the laser beam. Dependence of all-optical switching on pulse duration, laser intensity and the magneto-optical susceptibility strength is studied. An important aspect of this investigation is the analysis of how the cooling process influences the successive switches, especially through limiting the successive writing time.