Abstract
We have prepared hard-soft spin-valve systems by ultra-high vacuum evaporation. These spin-valves use a CoFe 1.5nm /Ir 0.5nm /CoFe 3nm artificial ferrimagnet (AFi) as a hard magnetic layer, and a Fe/Co bilayer as a detection layer. The Fe layer presents a strong anisotropy and a small interaction with the hard magnetic layer. The AFi is fully antiparallel and is stable up to 330 Oe and 530 Oe, respectively, along the easy (bcc Fe[100]) and the hard (bcc Fe[110]) magnetization axes. These characteristics are correlated with MFM observations made under magnetic field. By increasing the field from zero, ripple features are observed along the Fe[110] axis, and above 530 Oe, 360° domain walls start to develop. Along the Fe[100] axis the ripple features are not observed, but the domain walls characterizing the switching of the AFi are still present. Such magnetic structure plays an essential role in the interaction between the soft and the hard magnetic layers of the spin-valve, which is unfavorable for sensor applications.
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