Current-induced domain wall motion

The present understanding of domain wall motion induced by spin-polarized electric current is assessed by considering a subset of experiments, analytical models, and numerical simulations based on an important model system: soft magnetic nanowires. Examination of this work demonstrates notable progress in characterizing the experimental manifestations of the “spin-torque” interaction, and in describing that interaction at a phenomenological level. At the same time, an experimentally verified microscopic understanding of the basic mechanisms will require substantial future efforts, both experimental and theoretical.     

Hysteresis mediated by a domain wall motion

The position of an interface (domain wall) in a medium with random pinning defects is not determined unambiguously by the instantaneous value of the driving force, even on average. Employing the general theory of the interface motion in a random medium, we study this hysteresis, different possible shapes of the hysteresis loop, and the dynamical phase transitions between them. Several principal characteristics of the hysteresis, including the coercive force and the curves of dynamical phase transitions obey scaling laws and display a critical behavior in the vicinity of the mobility threshold. At finite temperature the threshold is smeared and a new range of thermally activated hysteresis appears. At a finite frequency of the driving force there exists a range of the non-adiabatic regime in which not only the position, but also the average velocity of the domain wall, displays hysteresis.     

Concept of the field-driven domain wall motion memory

In this paper, the concept of field-driven domain wall motion memory is presented. It is confirmed that a domain is shifted with a carefully designed non-uniform field by micromagnetic simulations. The shift of a domain—a bit—can be established by the motion of two domain walls to the same direction and the same distance. In order to get a better understanding of the domain wall motion under the non-uniform transverse magnetic field, we investigate the motion of the transverse Néel-type domain wall by micromagnetic simulations and the collective coordinate approach. The validity of the equation of motion for the domain wall is confirmed by the micromagnetic simulations as functions of the gradient of the non-uniform field, the saturation magnetization, and the Gilbert damping parameter α.     

Energy landscape study by telegraph noise of domain wall motion

The energy barrier landscape in-between two adjacent pinning sites of magnetic domain wall was investigated by telegraph noise of domain wall motion. The telegraph noise provided numerous depinning times for each pinning site, from which the depinning energy barrier characteristics were extracted. By generating the telegraph noise under application of magnetic field and electric current, the energy barrier landscape could be reconstructed with the barrier height and lateral size of the adjacent pinning sites. The lateral size fits well with other independent estimation based on the signal level with the focused laser beam, providing the validity of the present approach.     

Interaction of a shear wave with a moving domain wall in an iron garnet crystal

The boundary-value problem of the interaction of a plane monochromatic shear wave with a moving Bloch wall in an iron garnet crystal is solved in the framework of the nonexchange magnetostatic approximation on the basis of the method of phase invariants for wave problems with moving boundaries. For a shear wave incident on the domain wall, the possibility of the reflectionless birefringence is demonstrated. Numerical results illustrating the resonance properties of the magnetic subsystem are presented. It is established that, at the upper bound of the reflectionless birefringence range, the interaction of the shear wave with the domain wall manifests itself as a degenerate resonance with the solution in the form of two combined antiphase, collinearly propagating shear waves of infinitely large amplitudes, which form a zero resulting field.     

Universality classes of magnetic domain wall motion

We examine magnetic domain wall motion in metallic nanowires Pt-Co-Pt. Regardless of whether the motion is driven by either magnetic fields or current, all experimental data fall onto a single universal curve in the creep regime, implying that both the motions belong to the same universality class. This result is in contrast to the report on magnetic semiconductor (Ga,Mn)As exhibiting two different universality classes. Our finding signals the possible existence of yet other universality classes which go beyond the present understanding of the statistical mechanics of driven interfaces.     

Representability of the domain wall motion in random potentials by the Preisach model

The question of representability of quasi-static domain wall motion in random potentials by the Preisach model (PM) of hysteresis is studied. It is shown analytically and illustrated by a numerical experiment, that domain wall motion in a pinning field whose first spatial derivative is a stationary random process is exactly representable by the PM.     

Crossed-ratchet effects for magnetic domain wall motion

We study both experimentally and theoretically the driven motion of domain walls in extended amorphous magnetic films patterned with a periodic array of asymmetric holes. We find two crossed-ratchet effects of opposite sign that change the preferred sense for domain wall propagation, depending on whether a flat or a kinked wall is moving. By solving numerically a simple phi(4) model we show that the essential physical ingredients for this effect are quite generic and could be realized in other experimental systems involving elastic interfaces moving in multidimensional ratchet potentials.     

The stochastic nature of the domain wall motion along high perpendicular anisotropy strips with surface roughness

The domain wall dynamics along thin ferromagnetic strips with high perpendicular magnetocrystalline anisotropy driven by either magnetic fields or spin-polarized currents is theoretically analyzed by means of full micromagnetic simulations and a one-dimensional model, including both surface roughness and thermal effects. At finite temperature, the results show a field dependence of the domain wall velocity in good qualitative agreement with available experimental measurements, indicating a low field, low velocity creep regime, and a high field, linear regime separated by a smeared depinning region. Similar behaviors were also observed under applied currents. In the low current creep regime the velocity-current characteristic does not depend significantly on the non-adiabaticity. At high currents, where the domain wall velocity becomes insensitive to surface pinning, the domain wall shows a precessional behavior even when the non-adiabatic parameter is equal to the Gilbert damping. These analyses confirm the relevance of both thermal fluctuations and surface roughness for the domain wall dynamics, and that complete micromagnetic modeling and one-dimensional studies taking into account these effects are required to interpret the experimental measurements in order to get a better understanding of the origin, the role and the magnitude of the non-adiabaticity.     

Magnetoelastic domain wall wave in a ferromagnet

We show that in a magnetically and elastically uniaxial ferromagnetic insulator, a new type of inhomogeneous elastic wave may propagate along a 180° domain wall. A numerical example is given.     

On the interaction of a shear wave with a moving domain wall in a nonlinear response of the spin subsystem

A solution of the problem of parametric interaction between a plane monochromatic shear wave and a uniformly moving 180°-domain wall of a garnet-ferrite crystal is obtained in the exchangeless magnetostatic approximation by using the perturbation method under the conditions of a nonlinear response of the spin subsystem. It is shown that in a ferromagnetic resonance with magnetostatic oscillation of stray fields, the nonlinearity of the spin subsystem leads to the excitation of shear waves of triple frequency, which may have amplitudes comparable with that of the incident wave for oscillations doubly localized by a domain wall.     

Effect of surface properties on the shear wave parameters

The interaction of a viscous gas with a vibrating surface is studied in terms of the Maxwell boundary conditions with regard to isothermal slip.     

Dynamics of magnetic domain wall motion after nucleation: dependence on the wall energy

The dynamics of magnetic domain wall motion in the FeNi layer of a FeNi/Al2O3/Co trilayer has been investigated by a combination of x-ray magnetic circular dichroism, photoelectron emission microscopy, and a stroboscopic pump-probe technique. The nucleation of domains and subsequent expansion by domain wall motion in the FeNi layer during nanosecond-long magnetic field pulses was observed in the viscous regime up to the Walker limit field. We attribute an observed delay of domain expansion to the influence of the domain wall energy that acts against the domain expansion and that plays an important role when domains are small.     

Barkhausen jumps in the motion of a single ferroelectric domain wall

It is shown that the motion of a domain wall in the improper ferroelectric-ferroelastic gadolinium molybdate Gd₂(MoO₄)₃ demonstrates a self-organized critical behavior under polarization reversal. Barkhausen pulses are measured experimentally during the jumpwise motion of a single plane domain wall in monocrystalline plates with artificial pinning centers of the “field inhomogeneity” type.     

Magnetic domain wall motion by current injection in CoPt nanowires consisting of notches

Magnetic domain wall behaviors in CoPt nanowires consisting of multiple pairs of notches were investigated by experimental measurements as well as by micromagnetic modeling. The nanowires were fabricated by ion-beam sputter deposition and e-beam lithography where one to three triangular shaped notches were installed at an interval of 1 μm. Based on the evaluated I–V characteristics, we observed that differential resistance curves showed two peaks with a local minimum at around zero current; the domain wall was trapped between the current ranges within these two peaks. As the number of notch was increased, the resistance of the nanowire became larger.     

Determination of the losses induced by irreversible barkhausen jumps of the 180° domain wall moving with a sinusoidal motion in the single domain wall model

The paper presents an analysis of the losses due to irreversible Barkhausen jump of the 180° Bloch wall in the single-domain wall model. The field-intensity and current-density vectors at unit input were determined for a single instantaneous jump. The losses were calculated for the case of the wall moving sinusoidally. The Parseval formula was used at determining the losses, which made it possible to perform calculations. A similar problem was considered by Allia and Vinai who adopted a simplified assumption of the domain of an infinitely long cylindrical shape.     

Interaction of a shear wave with a moving domain wall in a ferromagnetic crystal with allowance for the external magnetic field

The boundary-value problem of the magnetoelastic wave interaction with a moving domain wall in a ferromagnetic crystal is solved in the nonexchange magnetostatic approximation with allowance for the external magnetic field. It is shown that the difference introduced by magnetic field between the ferromagnetic resonance frequencies of the domains does not cause any noticeably departure of the refraction characteristics of reflected and transmitted waves from those observed at zero frequency mismatch. By contrast, the magnitudes of the transmission and reflection coefficients strongly depend on the external magnetic field and on the mobility of the domain wall. The dependence of the magnitude of the reflection coefficient on the external magnetic field at a fixed angle of shear wave incidence is found to possess two ferromagnetic resonance peaks. The positions and heights of the peaks may vary depending on the mobility of the domain wall.     

Modes of periodic domain wall motion in ultrathin ferromagnetic layers

Magnetization reversal in a periodic magnetic field is studied on an ultrathin, ultrasoft ferromagnetic Pt/Co(0.5 nm)/Pt trilayer exhibiting weak random domain wall (DW) pinning. The DW motion is imaged by polar magneto-optic Kerr effect microscopy and monitored by superconducting quantum interference device susceptometry. In close agreement with model predictions, the complex linear ac susceptibility corroborates the dynamic DW modes segmental relaxation, creep, slide, and switching.     

Temperature dependence of the spin torque effect in current-induced domain wall motion

We present an experimental study of domain wall motion induced by current pulses as well as by conventional magnetic fields at temperatures between 2 and 300 K in a 110 nm wide and 34 nm thick Ni80Fe20 ring. We observe that, in contrast with field-induced domain wall motion, which is a thermally activated process, the critical current density for current-induced domain wall motion increases with increasing temperature, which implies a reduction of the spin torque efficiency. The effect of Joule heating due to the current pulses is measured and taken into account to obtain critical fields and current densities at constant sample temperatures. This allows for a comparison of our results with theory.