Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
9594911 | Surface Science | 2005 | 8 Pages |
Abstract
We have reinvestigated the Cu capping effect for Ni films on clean Cu(0Â 0Â 1) by means of polar and longitudinal magneto-optical Kerr effect measurements in order to account for previous discrepancies among the results regarding whether the Cu capping stabilizes perpendicular or in-plane magnetization. We concluded that Cu capping stabilizes perpendicular magnetization. We also found that the previous erroneous observation of in-plane stabilization could be accounted for by the presence of a small amount of C contamination, which was revealed to stabilize perpendicular magnetization surprisingly. The C atoms were found to act as surfactants and were always located at the top surface. As regards perpendicularly magnetized films on clean Cu(0Â 0Â 1), the enhancement of the coercivity with Cu capping was observed. This finding indicates that Cu does not act as a simple magnetism killer but effectively suppresses the surface anisotropy that favors in-plane magnetization.
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Physical Sciences and Engineering
Chemistry
Physical and Theoretical Chemistry
Authors
Takeshi Nakagawa, Hirokazu Watanabe, Toshihiko Yokoyama,