Imaging of magnetic domains with the X-ray microscope at BESSY using X-ray magnetic circular dichroism

X-ray Magnetic Circular Dichroism (X-MCD), i.e. the change of the absorption of circular polarized Xrays for reversed sample magnetization amounts at the L_{2, 3}-edges of 3d transition metals up to 50% percent. This can be used to obtain in energy-dispersive X-ray imaging techniques a considerable, element-specific magnetic contrast. On the other hand, with the transmission X-ray microscope (TXM) based on the zone-plate technique spatial resolutions of 30nm can be achieved. In this communication it is shown for the first time that the combination of the TXM with XMCD provides a huge contrast and is therefore a powerful new method to visualize in a quantitative and elementspecific manner magnetic domains. Using soft X-rays with a wavelength of 1:7nm corresponding to the energy of the Fe L₃-edge the variation of the shape and magnetization of domains in a magneto-optical GdFe layer system was studied with a lateral resolution of 60nm.