Abstract
Cylindrical nanodisks typically exhibit in-plane magnetization reversal comprising of nucleation and propagation of a vortex closure state. Present work investigates the magnetization reversal process in a cylindrical disk of radius ranging from 20 nm to 100 nm in which the flat surfaces at top and bottom are modified to convex shaped surfaces. It is found that the nucleation of vortex state no longer occurs as a result of this surface modification. Instead, a buckled magnetization state is nucleated which transforms to reverse buckled state yielding a square hysteresis loop. However, the out-of-plane hysteresis loop exhibits a vortex state at remanence. Analytical calculation of total free energy of both vortex as well as buckled state and the comparison thereof shows that the vortex state is ground state if radius of nanodisk is above 60 nm . Below this critical radius, buckled state is the ground state. But the non-appearance of vortex state at remanence in in-plane hysteresis loop of all of the nanodisks indicates a presence of energy barrier between vortex and buckled state. Height of the energy barrier is estimated using nudged elastic band method (NEBM) in all cases which proves that the energy barrier for vortex state weakens and the barrier for buckled state intensifies with the reduction of nanodisk size. At the critical radius of 60 nm , crossover of the two barrier heights occurs. Eventually, at the radius of 30 nm , the vortex state becomes totally unstable which can be toppled to buckled state with the slightest of perturbation.
Published Version
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