Understanding the magnetic behaviour of thin film elements is of major importance for magnetic storage applications. To store data in a digital form, it is necessary for each element to support two distinct remanent magnetisation configurations. It must also be possible to switch reproducibly between the states using an applied field. Simple geometric structures however are able to support a variety of metastable remanent configurations [1] which can lead to irreproducibility in the switching behaviour. As a result, the optimum geometry for supporting the stored information is an important issue. Here we present initial TEM results backed by micromagnetic simulations in which variations in element geometry and symmetry can lead to a greater control of the states that can be formed.
展开▼
