• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.97-100
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• 2004

In the present work exchange coupling between ultrathin Fe ($8{\AA}$) and Tb ($12{\AA}$) layers separated by Au spacer of varied thickness ($3-20{\AA}$) was studied. Anomalous Hall effect measurements showed weakly damped oscillating dependence of the Hall conductivity as a function of Au spacer thickness. Disagreement of the observed damping with the RKKY model of interlayer exchange coupling was explained by the influence of external magnetic field on the behaviour of exchange coupling oscillations. It was confirmed by Hall-like effect measurements at zero applied magnetic field and also illustrated by corresponding estimations.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.52-59
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• 2004

As deposited and annealed MTJs with the structure of $Ta(5 nm)/Cu(10 nm)/Ta(5 nm)/Ni_{80}Fe_{20}(2 nm)/Cu(5 nm)/ Ir_{25}Mn_{75}(10 nm)/Co_{70}Fe_{30}(2.5 nm)/Al-O/Co_{70}Fe_{30}(2.5nm)/Ni_{80}Fe_{20}(t)/Ta(5nm)/Ni_{80}Fe_{20}(t)/Ta(5 nm)$, where t=10, 30, 60 and 100 nm were characterized by XRD and magnetic hysteresis loops measurements. The XRD measurements were done in grazing incidence $(GID scan-2{\theta})$ and ${\theta}-2{\theta}$ geometry, by rocking curve $(scan-{\omega})$ and pole figures in order to establish correlation between texture and crystallites size and magnetic parameters of exchange biased and interlayer coupling. The variations of shifting and coercivity field of free and pinned layers after annealing in $300^{\circ}C$ correlate with the improvement of ［111］ texture and grains size of $Ni_{80}Fe_{20}$ and $Ir_{25}Mn_{75}$ respectively. The exchange biased and the coercivity fields of the pinned layer linearly increased with increasing grain size of $Ir_{25}Mn_{75}$, The reciprocal proportionality between interlayer coupling and coercivity fields of the free layer and grain size of $Ni_{80}Fe_{20}$ was found. The enhancement of interlayer coupling between pinned and free layers, after annealing treatment, indicates on the correlated in-phase roughness of dipolar interacting interfaces due to increase of crystallites size of $Ni_{80}Fe_{20}$.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.7 no.5
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• pp.258-264
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• 1997

Exchange and interlayer couplings between a NiFe ferromagnetic layer and an antiferromagnetic NiO layer in NiO/NiFe/Cu/NiFe spin-valve films prepared by rf/dc magnetron sputtering were investigated. The interlayer coupling field ($H_{int}$ decreased with the Cu layer thickness, and the exchange coupling field $(H_{ex}$ saturated to 90 Oe. the magnetitudes of $H_{ex}$ and $H_{int}$ decreased with increasing thickness of the pinned NiFe layer. The increase of $H_{int}$ with the free NiFe layer may be due to the increased magnetization.

• Electrical & Electronic Materials
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• v.9 no.10
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• pp.1060-1065
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• 1996

We have studied the magnetoresistance phenomena on spin valve thin films of antiferromagnetic NiO/CoO. Interlayer coupling oscillates between the antiferrocoupling and ferrocoupling with the variation of Cu thickness. The exchange coupling strength between NiO (antiferromagnetic) and NiFe(ferromagnetic) as a function of NiO texture and interface roughness is investigated by CoO insertion. CoO has significantly higher anisotropy in the (111) plane and interface roughness. It seems that the MR-ratio is increased by CoO inserted films. From the AFM and XRD data, the increase of MR-ratio and exchange field is influenced by the roughness of CoO.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.13-17
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• 2003

The longitudinal magnetooptical Kerr effect was used to analyse magnetic domains in soft magnetic ${(Fe_{97}A1_3)}_{85}N_{15}$/$Al_{2}O_{3}$ multilayers in order to get microscopic understanding of interlayer exchange coupling. The measuring system consists of a Kerr microscope, a CCIR camera (with an 8-bit framegrabber), 16 bit digital camera and computer system for real-time image processing and to control external magnetic field and cameras. The strength of ferromagnetic (EM) coupling as a function of the spacer thickness of $Al_2O_3$ was investigated. It was found that strong FM-coupling, strong uniaxial anisotropy and coherent rotation of the magnetization have been observed for the spacer thickness in the range of 0.2 nm $\leq$ t $\leq$ 1 m, however, weak FM-coupling, patch domains and $360^{\circ}$-walls occur for the spacer thickness of t = 2.5 nm. At a spacer thickness of t $\geq$ 5 nm transition takes place from weak FM-coupling to the decoupled state where complex interlayer interactions and different types of the domain walls were observed.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.72-77
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• 2001

Top spin valve films with PtMn antiferromagnetic layers were deposited using a multi-target dc magnetron sputtering in (100)Si substrates overcoated with 500 $\AA$ of Al$_2$O$_3$. Firstly, the post-deposition annealing was performed at 270$\^{C}$ in a unidirectional magnetic field of 3 kOe to induce the crystallographic transformation of the PtMn layer from a fcc (111) to a fct (111) structure. Secondly, the spin valve films were annealed without magnetic fields and magnetic properties were measured. In Si/A1$_2$O$_3$ (500$\AA$)/Ta(50$\AA$)NiFe(40$\AA$)/CoFe(17$\AA$)/Cu(28$\AA$)/CoFe (30$\AA$)PtMn(200$\AA$)Ta(50$\AA$) top spin valve samples, the MR ratio decreased slowly with increasing annealing temperature up to 325$\^{C}$. But above 325$\^{C}$, the MR ratio decreased rapidly to 1%, due to a collapse of the exchange coupling between a antiferromagnetic layer and a pinned layer with increasing annealing temperature. Also above 325$\^{C}$, the exchange biased field rapidly decreased and the interlayer coupling field rapidly increased with increasing annealing temperature. A change in the interlayer coupling field was resulted from the increase in interface roughness due to Mn-interdiffusion through the grain boundaries. We confirmed the temperature in changing magnetic properties agreed well with the blocking temperature of PtMn based spin valve structure.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.92-95
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• 1998

In this paper we report the low and high angle diffraction results, and the magnetic and magnetroesistive characteristics of the spin valve multilayer structure prepared by the sputter machine Emerald II in the Balzers Laboratory. The investigated system consists of a ferromagnetic free layer (7 nm NiFe) and a ferromagnetic pinned layer (7 nm NiFe), separated from each other by a nonmagnetic (2.1 nm Cu) spacer. The NiFe pinned layer is fixed by the exchange coupling with an antiferromagnetic layer (10 nm FeMn). For such system the magnetoresistance ratio ΔR/R=3.58%, the interlayer exchange coupling $H_c=6.4$ Oe and the field sensitivity 1.15%/Oe were otained.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.113-117
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• 2005

Some polycrystalline ferromagnetic mms are composed of continuously connected nanometer scale islands with random crystallite orientations. The nanometer perturbations of the mm introduce a large number of nearly degenerate local field configurations that are indistiguishable on a macroscopic scale. As a first step, this situation is modelled as a thin ferromagnetic disc coupled by exchange and dipole interactions to a homogeneous ferromagnetic plane, where the disc and plane have different easy axes. The model is solved to find the partial $N\acute{e}el$ domain walls that minimize the magnetic energy. The two solutions give a bistable configuration that, for appropriate geometries, provides an important microsopic ferromagnetic degree of freedom for the mm. These results are used to interpret recent measurements of exchange biased bilayer films.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.82-86
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• 2017

The IrMn based GMR-SV films with three different buffer layers were prepared on Corning glass by using ion beam deposition and DC magnetron sputtering method. The major and minor magnetoresistance curves for three different buffer layers beneath the structure of NiFe(15 nm)/CoFe(5 nm)/Cu(2.5 nm)/CoFe(5 nm)/NiFe(7 nm)/IrMn(10 nm)/Ta(5 nm) at room temperature have shown different magnetoresistance properties. When the samples were annealed at $250^{\circ}C$ in vacuum, the magnetoresistance ratio, the coercivity of pinned ferromagnetic layer, and the interlayer coupling field of free ferromagnetic layer were enhanced while the exchange bias coupling field did not show noticeable changes.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.7 no.5
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• pp.265-273
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• 1997

The MR ratios and the exchange biasing field and interlayer coupling field were investigated in $Ni_{91}Fe_{19}/Co_{90}Fe_{10}/Cu/Co_{90}Fe_{10}/NiO$ spin-valve sandwiches grown on antiferromagnetic NiO films as a function of the NiO thickness, the thickness of Cu and pinning layer $Co_{90}Fe_{10}$. The spin-valve sandwiches were deposited on the Corning glass 7059 by means of the 3-gun dc and 1-gun rf magnetron sputtering at a 5 mtorrpartial Ar pressure and room temperature. The deposition field was 50 Oe. The MR curve was measured by the four-terminal method with applied magnetic soft bilayer [NiFe/CoFe] (90$\AA$) decreased dramatically to less than 10 Oe when the NiFe/CoFe bilayer used an NiFe bilayer thicker that 20$\AA$. So NiFe layer improved the softmagnetic properties in the NiFe/CoFe bilayer. The GMR ratio and the magnetic field sensitivity of the spin-valve film $Ni_{91}Fe_{19}(40{\AA})/Co_{90}Fe_{10}(50{\AA}) /Cu(30{\AA})/Co_{90}Fe_{10}(35{\AA})/NiO(800{\AA})$ was 6.3% and about 0.5 (%/Oe), respectively. The MR ratio had 5.3% below an annealing temperature of 20$0^{\circ}C$ which slowly decreased to 3% above 30$0^{\circ}C$. The large blocking temperature of the spin-valve film was taken (as being) due to the good stability of the NiO films. Thus, the spin-valve films with a free NiFe/CoFe layer clearly had a high large GMR output and showed a effective magnetic field sensitivity for a suitable spin-valve head material.