Interplay between anisotropic strain relaxation and uniaxial interface magnetic anisotropy in epitaxial Fe films on (001) GaAs.
Grazing incidence x-ray diffraction study of Fe epitaxial ultrathin films (1.5-13 nm) on GaAs (001) reveals an anisotropy of both domain shape and strain, with [110] and [1-10] as the principal directions. It is shown that the observed thickness-dependent strain anisotropy, together with a uniaxial interface term, can provide an unambiguous explanation to the usual in-plane magnetic anisotropy and its thickness dependence observed in this magnetic thin-film system.
Thomas
O
O
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
Shen
Q
Q
Schieffer
P
P
Tournerie
N
N
Lépine
B
B