Optical imaging of antiferromagnetic domains in ultrathin CoO(001) films

Abstract

Antiferromagnetic (AFM) domains in ultrathin CoO(001) films are imaged by a wide-field optical microscopy using magneto-optical birefringence effect. The magnetic origin of observed optical contrast is confirmed by the spin orientation manipulation through exchange coupling in Fe/CoO(001) bilayer. The finite size effect of ordering temperature for ultrathin single crystal CoO film is revealed by the thickness and temperature dependent measurement of birefringence contrast. The magneto-optical birefringence effect is found to strongly depend on the photon energy of incident light, and a surprising large polarization rotation angle up to 168.5 mdeg is obtained from a 4.6 nm CoO film with a blue light source, making it possible to further investigate the evolution of AFM domains in AFM ultrathin film under external field.

11 pages,5 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Writing and Reading antiferromagnetic Mn${}_2$Au: Néel spin-orbit torques and large anisotropic magnetoresistance
• Controlling orbital moment and spin orientation in CoO layers by strain
• Optical Spectroscopy in CoO: Phonons, Electric, and Magnetic Excitations

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