Exchange bias and spin valve systems with Fe–Mn antiferromagnetic pinning layers, obtained by the thermo-ionic vacuum arc method

Exchange bias and spin valve systems with Fe–Mn antiferromagnetic layers of different Fe concentrations were obtained by the thermo-ionic vacuum arc method. The adherence of the multilayer system to the Si substrate depends on the Fe–Mn composition. The overall roughness depends on the growing order of the antiferromagnetic/ferromagnetic layers. Very low blocking temperatures for exchange bias were observed for the considered compositions of the Fe–Mn layer. The coercive forces of both the pinned and the free layers of spin valve structures can be considerably modified along a large set of samples simultaneously prepared.     

The effect of annealing on the MR and exchange bias characteristics in dual spin valve with nano-oxide layer

We investigated magnetoresistance (MR) and exchange bias properties by annealing in the dual spin valve (SV) with nano-oxide layer (NOL). By analyzing effects of NOL in top and bottom pinned simple SVs, MR enhancement effect of NOL inserted in the bottom pinned layer was higher than that of NOL in the top pinned layer with annealing. By the enhanced specular scattering of electrons by NOL, the MR ratio of dual SV with NOL was increased to 15.5–15.9% with an annealing of 200–250°C. Exchange coupling constant J_ex was improved rapidly as 0.13–0.16 erg/cm² by annealing in the bottom pinned layer, whereas the effect of annealing was not large in the top pinned layer with J_ex of about 0.09–0.116 erg/cm².     

Spin valves with CoO as an exchange bias layer

The temperature dependence (50–300 K) of the magnetoresistance and exchange bias field of spin valves with a CoO exchange bias layer have been investigated. At room temperature the GMR effect is enhanced in comparison with spin valves with a FeMn biasing layer. This enhancement increases for decreasing temperature for small Cu thicknesses. No influence of the antiferromagnetism of CoO on the GMR has been observed upon crossing of the Néel temperature.     

Bi对自旋阀钉扎场的影响及机理

实验发现将Bi插入自旋阀多层膜TaNiFeCuBi(x)NiFeFeMn中可以显著地提高自旋阀的钉扎场Hex.采用XPS对Cu,Bi元素的分布情况进行了研究,发现Bi的插入明显抑制了Cu原子在自旋阀的制备过程中在NiFeFeMn界面的偏聚.进一步研究表明:自旋阀钉扎层NiFeFeMn界面中,Cu原子的存在是导致自旋阀Hex小于TaNiFeFeMn多层膜Hex的主要原因. 关键词： 自旋阀 钉扎场 交换各向异性 表面活化剂     

Exchange bias mechanism in FM/FM/AF spin valve systems in the presence of random unidirectional anisotropy field at the AF interface: The role played by the interface roughness due to randomness

We propose an atomistic model and present Monte Carlo simulation results regarding the influence of FM/AF interface structure on the hysteresis mechanism and exchange bias behavior for a spin valve type FM/FM/AF magnetic junction. We simulate perfectly flat and roughened interface structures both with uncompensated interfacial AF moments. In order to simulate rough interface effect, we introduce the concept of random exchange anisotropy field induced at the interface, and acting on the interface AF spins. Our results yield that different types of the random field distributions of anisotropy field may lead to different behavior of exchange bias.     

A new paradigm for exchange bias in polycrystalline thin films

In this paper we provide a review and overview of a series of works generated in our laboratory over the last 5 years. These works have described the development and evolution of a new paradigm for exchange bias in polycrystalline thin films with grain sizes in the range 5-15 nm. We have shown that the individual grains in the antiferromagnetic (AF) layer of exchange bias systems contain a single AF domain and reverse over an energy barrier which is grain volume dependent. We show that the AF grains are not coupled to each other and behave independently. Understanding this process and using designed measurement protocols has enabled us to determine unambiguously the blocking temperature distribution of the AF grains, the anisotropy constant (K_AF) of the AF, understand the AF grain-setting process, and predict its magnetic viscosity. We can explain and predict the grain size and film thickness dependence of the exchange field H_ex. We have also studied interfacial effects and shown that there are processes at the interface, which can occur independently of the bulk of the AF grains. We have seen these effects via studies of trilayers and also via the field dependence of the setting process which does not affect the blocking. From separate experiments we have shown that the disordered interfacial spins exist as spin clusters analogous to a spin glass. These clusters can order spontaneously at low temperatures or can be ordered by the setting field. We believe it is the degree of order of the interfacial spins that gives rise to the coercivity in exchange bias systems. Based on this new understanding of the behaviour of the bulk of the grains in the antiferromagnet and the interfacial spins we believe that we have now a new paradigm for the phenomenon of exchange bias in sputtered polycrystalline thin films. We emphasize that the phenomenological model does not apply to core-shell particles, epitaxial single-crystal films and large grain polycrystalline films.     

Long-range exchange bias through a metal spacer

We have theoretically analyzed the long-range exchange bias between a ferromagnet and an antiferromagnet separated by a nonmagnetic metal spacer. The Fermi–Dirac distribution was included in the Ruderman–Kittel–Kasuya–Yosida interaction to study the thermal effects of the conduction electrons, and thus to study the temperature effects and thickness dependence in the trilayer structure. The experimentally observed oscillatory exchange bias through the metal spacer is in good agreement with the calculated results.     

Thickness dependence of positive exchange bias in ferromagnetic/antiferromagnetic bilayers

For the ferromagnetic (FM)/antiferromagnetic (AFM) bilayers, both negative and positive exchange bias H_E have been observed for low and high cooling field H_CF, respectively. The thickness dependence of H_E and coercivity H_C have been investigated for the cases of negative and positive H_E. It is found that the negative H_E and the positive one have similar FM thickness dependence that is attributed to the interfacial nature of exchange bias. However, the AFM thickness dependence of positive H_E is completely contrary to that of the negative one, which clearly demonstrates that the AFM spins play different roles for the cases of positive and negative H_E. In particular, the AFM thickness of positive H_E was first highlighted by an AFM spin canting model. These results should be attributed to the interfacial spin configuration after field cooling procedure.     

Detection of spin bias in a four-terminal quantum-dot ring

In this work, via introducing local Rashba spin-orbit interaction in a four-terminal quantum-dot (QD) ring, we show that the spin bias in the transverse terminals induces apparent charge currents in the longitudinal terminals, accompanied by the similar magnitude and opposite directions of them. The reason is that the Rashba interaction destroys the space-reversal symmetry of this structure and causes the spin dependence of the quantum interference. Then the opposite-spin currents driven by the spin bias present different magnitudes, which gives rise to the emergence of finite charge currents in the longitudinal terminals. Via these results, we suggest that the spin bias can be measured by observing the longitudinal charge currents, which provides an electrical but practical scheme to detect the spin bias (or spin current).     

Correlation between the exchange bias and the degree of ordering of antiferromagnetic layer in PtMn/Co–Fe bilayers

Correlation between the unidirectional anisotropy constant, J_K, and the degree of ordering of PtMn layer was investigated for Pt₅₅Mn₄₅/Co₉₀Fe₁₀ bilayer, as a function of the annealing time and the PtMn layer thickness, d_AF. As a result, we found the linear relations between J_K and the degree of ordering, f_FCT·S, in the cases of the bilayers with d_AF=5–50 nm. From the extrapolation of the linear relations to f_FCT·S=1, meaning the perfect ordering of PtMn layer, we obtained the attainable value of J_K and the intrinsic critical thickness of the PtMn layer to be 0.26 erg/cm² and 6 nm, respectively.     

Conserved spin current with a perpendicular magnetic field

Previous theoretical studies show that the spin current in spin-orbit coupled systems can be effectively conserved. In this study, we show that in the presence of an external magnetic field B perpendicular to the surface without causing Landau levels, the spin-Hall conductivity, including the conventional spin and spin-torque Hall currents exhibit an interesting symmetry, ${\sigma }_{xy}^c(B)={\sigma }_{xy}^c(-B)$ valid for k-linear and k-cubic Rashba systems. The phenomenon where the electric field generated spin z component is unaltered under $B\to -B$ is attributed to the fact that the spin precession is locked in spin-orbit coupled systems. The perpendicular magnetic field generates spin x and y components, which are linear to B, and thus, there is no time-reversal symmetry. This result provides evidence for the detection of the bulk spin-Hall current. Furthermore, the applied magnetic field breaks the degenerate point of the two-band model, and the resulting spin-Hall conductivity does not vanish even for systems with linear momentum, which implies that the Berry phase is not the principal mechanism in k-linear systems. The non-zero charge-Hall conductivity generated by the perpendicular magnetic field is discussed here.     

Manipulating edge current spin polarization in zigzag MoS2 nanoribbons

The electronic structure and quantum transport of a zigzag monolayer molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂) nanoribbon are investigated using a six-band tight-binding model. For metallic edge modes, considering both an intrinsic spin–orbit coupling and local exchange field effects, spin degeneracy and spin inversion symmetry are broken and spin selective transport is possible. Our model is a three-terminal field effect transistor with a circular-shaped gate voltage in the middle of scattering region. One terminal measures the top edge current and the other measures the bottom edge current separately. By controlling the circular gate voltage, each terminal can detect a totally spin-polarized edge current. The radius of the circular gate and the strength of the exchange field are important, because the former determines the size of the channel in both S-terminated (top) and Mo-terminated (bottom) edges and the latter is strongly related to unbalancing of the density of spin states. The results presented here suggest that it should be possible to construct spin filters using implanted MoS₂ nanoribbons.     

Spin-orbit torques induced by spin Hall and spin swapping currents of a separate ferromagnet in a magnetic trilayer

Spin-orbit torques (SOTs) have been investigated most widely in normal metal/ferromagnet bilayers where the spin Hall effect of normal metal is a main source of spin currents. Recently, ferromagnets are found to also serve as spin-current sources through spin-orbit coupling. In this work, we theoretically investigate SOT acting on ferromagnet₂ in ferromagnet₁/normal metal/ferromagnet₂ trilayers, which is caused by the spin Hall and spin swapping effects of ferromagnet₁. Our result provides an analytical expression of SOT in the trilayers, which may be useful for quantifying the spin Hall and spin swapping effects of ferromagnets and also for designing and interpreting SOT experiments where a ferromagnet is used as a spin-current source instead of a normal metal.     

Relative-thickness dependence of exchange bias in bilayers and trilayers

We consider the models of ferromagnetic (FM)/antiferromagnetic (AFM) bilayers and trilayers and perform a modified Monte Carlo method to study their exchange bias (EB) properties at low temperature after field cooling on increasing one component thickness at the expense of the other one. The results indicate that EB is insensitive to the thickness variations as the FM layer is thicker than the AFM one. Otherwise, it has a steep increase with the decrease of FM thickness, but the purely inverse proportion is no longer valid due to the dual influences of FM and AFM thicknesses. EB in trilayers should be approximately twice larger than that in bilayers because there is a double interfacial area in the trilayers compared with the bilayers, but the dispersed FM/AFM distributions may break this relation as a result of thermal destabilization. Moreover, EB is independent of FM/AFM stacking sequences probably because of the ideal interface between them. It has been clarified unambiguously that such control of EB through varying the FM/AFM dimensions in heterostructures is attractive for spintronics applications.     

Self-consistent treatment of spin and magnetization dynamic effect in spin transfer switching

The effect of itinerant spin moment (m) dynamic in spin transfer switching has been ignored in most previous theoretical studies of the magnetization (M) dynamics. Thus in this paper, we proposed a more refined micromagnetic model of spin transfer switching that takes into account in a self-consistent manner of the coupled m and M dynamics. The numerical results obtained from this model further shed insight on the switching profiles of m and M, both of which show particular sensitivity to parameters such as the anisotropy field, the spin torque field, and the initial deviation between m and M.     

The effects of Co-metal clusters on exchange bias for Co-doped NiO/FeNi bilayers

Co-doped NiO inhomogeneous films were synthesized by sputtering metallic Co chips and NiO together and the exchange bias of bilayers Co-doped NiO/FeNi was investigated. When Co content was up to 25.2%, the exchange bias field H_E at the room temperature increased to the maximum which was about three times compared to the undoped-bilayers. With further increase of Co content, the exchange bias field H_E and blocking temperature T_B decreased. Analysis suggests that the configuration of nanometer-sized Co-metal clusters enchased into NiO matrix played an important role in the change of magnetic behavior for the bilayers.     

Spin-dependent transport in a nanopillar non-local spin valve

We investigate the injection of a pure spin current into a non-magnetic Cu wire in a lateral spin valve. We detect the spin accumulation occurring at the interfaces between the magnetic nanopillars and the non-magnetic wire in the non-local geometry. We confirm that the accumulated spins diffuse equally in the Cu wire irrespective of the presence of a charge current. The inversion of the injector and detector magnetic nanopillars does not affect the spin signal, in agreement with analytical predictions for this system.     

Interface induced exchange bias effect in La0.67Sr0.33MnO3/SrIrO3 multilayer

Epitaxial superlattices of ferromagnetic/paramagnetic La_0.67Sr_0.33MnO₃/SrIrO₃ materials have been prepared on SrTiO₃ (100) substrate using pulse laser deposition technique. An unexpected onset of interface magnetic interaction has been observed around 40 K. Interestingly, magnetic exchange bias effect has been observed in both field cooled and zero field cooled magnetization loops, however, the shifting of loop is opposite in both measurements. Exchange bias field vanishes as temperature increases to interface magnetic ordering temperature. Moreover, exchange bias field is found to decrease with increasing cooling field. We believe that tuning of magnetic exchange at interface during field cooling induces this evolution in nature of exchange bias field.     

Switching field modulation of a nanomagnet by resonant microwave spin torque

We report on the effect of a low amplitude microwave current on the switching field of magnetic layers in a 40 nm diameter pseudo-spin valve grown by template synthesis. We show a frequency dependence at room temperature reflecting the dynamic behavior of the switching process. This is confirmed by numerical calculation of the Landau-Lifschitz-Gilbert equation including Slonczewski Spin Transfer Torque term within a macrospin approximation. The possibility to modulate the switching fields of a nanomagnet with microwave currents offers an alternative to the magnetic switching assisted by microwave magnetic field.