Temperature-induced reversal of magnetic interlayer exchange coupling

Abstract

For epitaxial trilayers of the magnetic rare-earth metals Gd and Tb, exchange coupled through a non-magnetic Y spacer layer, element-specific hysteresis loops were recorded by the x-ray magneto-optical Kerr effect at the rare-earth $M_5$ thresholds. This allowed us to quantitatively determine the strength of interlayer exchange coupling (IEC). In addition to the expected oscillatory behavior as a function of spacer-layer thickness $d_Y$, a temperature-induced sign reversal of IEC was observed for constant $d_Y$, arising from magnetization-dependent electron reflectivities at the magnetic interfaces.

4 pages, 4 figures; accepted version; minor changes and new Figs. 2 and 4 containing more data

References in corpus (1)

• On the origin of temperature dependence of interlayer exchange coupling in metallic trilayers