Antiferromagnetic spin dynamics in exchanged-coupled Fe/GdFeO3 heterostructure

We investigate the ultrafast spin dynamics of an antiferromagnet in a ferromagnet/antiferromagnet heterostructure Fe/GdFeO₃ via an all-optical method. After laser irradiation, the terahertz spin precession is hard to be excited in a bare GdFeO₃ without spin reorientation phase but efficiently in Fe/GdFeO₃. Both quasi-ferromagnetic and impurity modes, as well as a phonon mode, are observed. We attribute it to the optical modification of interfacial exchange coupling between Fe and GdFeO₃. Moreover, the excitation efficiency of dynamics can be modified significantly via the pump laser influence. Our results elucidate that the interfacial exchange coupling is a feasible stimulation to efficiently excite terahertz spin dynamics in antiferromagnets. It will expand the exploration of terahertz spin dynamics for antiferromagnet-based opto-spintronic devices.     

Thickness dependent manipulation of uniaxial magnetic anisotropy in Fe-thin films by oblique deposition

The uniaxial magnetic anisotropy of obliquely deposited Fe(001)/Pd film on MgO(001) substrate is investigated as a function of deposition angle and film thickness. The values of incidence angle of Fe flux relative to surface normal of the substrate are 0°, 45°, 55°, and 70°, respectively. In-situ low energy electron diffraction is employed to investigate the surface structures of the samples. The Fe film thicknesses are determined to be 50 ML, 45 ML, 32 ML, and 24 ML(1 ML = 0.14 nm) by performing x-ray reflectivity on the grown samples, respectively. The normalized remanent magnetic saturation ratio and coercivity are obtained by the longitudinal surface magneto-optical Kerr effect. Here, the magnetic anisotropy constants are quantitatively determined by fitting the anisotropic magnetoresistance curves under different fields.These measurements show four-fold cubic anisotropy in a large Fe film thickness(50 ML) sample, but highly in-plane uniaxial magnetic anisotropies in thin films(24 ML and 32 ML) samples. In the obliquely deposited Fe films, the coercive fields and the uniaxial magnetic anisotropies(UMAs) increase as the deposition angle becomes more and more tilted. In addition, the UMA decreases with the increase of the Fe film thickness. Our work provides the possibility of manipulating uniaxial magnetic anisotropy, and paves the way to inducing UMA by oblique deposition with smaller film thickness.