Thermal switching of indirect interlayer exchange in magnetic multilayers

Abstract

We propose a magnetic multilayer layout, in which the indirect exchange coupling (IEC also known as RKKY) can be switched on and off by a slight change in temperature. We demonstrate such on/off IEC switching in a Fe/Cr/FeCr-based system and obtain thermal switching widths as small as 10--20~K, essentially in any desired temperature range, including at or just above room temperature. These results add a new dimension of tunable thermal control to IEC in magnetic nanostructures, highly technological in terms of available materials and operating physical regimes.

3 figures, Supplementary Info

References in corpus (2)

• Temperature-induced reversal of magnetic interlayer exchange coupling
• Strong temperature dependence of antiferromagnetic coupling in CoFeB/Ru/CoFeB

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Giant magnetocaloric effect driven by indirect exchange in magnetic multilayers
• Thermal gating of magnon exchange in magnetic multilayers with antiferromagnetic spacers
• Magnetic hysteresis in nanostructures with thermally-controlled RKKY coupling
• Spin relaxation in multilayers with synthetic ferrimagnets
• Tuning thermo-magnetic properties of dilute-ferromagnet multilayers using RKKY interaction