Investigation of the Fe19Ni81/Fe50Mn50 exchange bias system with varying Cu spacer layer for partial decoupling

The exchange coupling across an interface between a ferromagnetic and an antiferromagnetic layer may result in the so-called exchange bias effect evidenced by a shift of the hysteresis loop along the magnetic field axis. To study the role of the exchange interaction at and near the interface, Ni81Fe19/Fe50Mn50 bilayers have been studied, which have an intervening Cu layer of varying thickness and position in the antiferromagnetic Fe50Mn50 layer. The role of the intervening Cu layer is to generate partial exchange decoupling. The main motivation is to investigate in which way each antiferromagnetic monolayer contributes to the total exchange bias and what governs the AF thickness dependence? In general introducing an intervening layer in the antiferromagnet can be understood as a well defined layer of defects. The interpretation of the results might be easier than for dilution experiments [1] and contribute to a deeper understanding of the correlation between exchange bias field and coercivity.
We have prepared and investigated a polycrystalline Ni81Fe19/Fe50Mn50 bilayer with an intervening wedge-shaped (0 – 7 Å) Cu layer. As a growth template a Si(100) wafer with a 150 Å thick Cu buffer layer was used. The thickness of the ferromagnetic Ni81Fe19 layer is 50 Å. On top a wedge (0 – 100 Å) of the antiferromagnetic Fe50Mn50 was grown. Next, a Cu spacer wedge was grown perpendicular to the wedge direction of the Fe50Mn50 film. Finally, an additional wedge of Fe50Mn50 was grown on top with the opposite direction in order to keep the total Fe50Mn50 thickness at 100 Å throughout the whole sample (see the sketches in Fig. 1). For protection a 20 Å thick Cr layer was deposited. As a result, a sample was obtained, where in one direction the position of the intervening Cu layer varies from the interface to the top surface of the Fe50Mn50 layer at constant Cu thickness, and in the other direction the Cu thickness varies. To initialize the exchange bias effect the sample was annealed above the Néel temperature and cooled in an applied field back to room temperature.
Hysteresis loops were measured as a function of position on the sample using longitudinal magneto-optic Kerr effect magnetometry. From the loops the exchange bias field Heb and the coercive field Hc were extracted as a function of the Cu spacer thickness, tCu, and of the thickness tFeMn of the lower Fe50Mn50 layer, which is directly exchange coupled to the Ni81Fe19 layer. The results are shown in Fig.1.
The obtained two-dimensional maps provide us easily with global information about the influence of the partial decoupling of the antiferromagnet as a function of tCu and tFeMn.
To obtain more quantitative information several line scans along the horizontal and vertical axes in Fig. 1 were evaluated (not shown here).
For the exchange bias field two different behaviors appear with increasing tFeMn. On one hand Heb decreases for a small Cu thickness close to the ferromagnetic/antiferromagnetic interface, on the other hand Heb increases for a small Cu thickness distant to the interface. For larger tFeMn the typical antiferromagnetic thickness dependence can be found. With increasing tCu a shift of the Heb maximum to higher tFeMn is observed. For a line scan along the Cu wedge for tFeMn = 0 a good agreement with previous results is found [2].
The evolution of the coercivity is different. For small Cu thickness tCu no variation of Hc is observed for scans along tFeMn. It can be concluded that there is no direct connection between exchange bias field Heb and coercive field Hc. The position of the Heb maximum depends on Cu thickness and position within the antiferromagnetic layer but the maximum in Hc always stays the same. In addition it is found that the exchange bias field also depends slightly on cap layer thickness.