Texture and magnetic properties of exchange bias systems

摘要

We report on the magnetic and structural properties of IrMn/CoFe exchange bias systems deposited onto a dual seed layer of NiCr(X)/Ru(5 nm), with X=2, 6, and 20 nm. Samples with the structure NiCr (Xnm)/IrMn (7 nm)/CoFe (3 nm)/Ta (10 nm) with X=2, 6, and 20 nm were prepared by dc sputtering for magnetic characterization. A second set of samples with structure NiCr (Xnm)/IrMn (10 nm) with X=2, 6, and 20 nm were deposited onto TEM grids for structural characterization by TEM. A method of manipulating of the TEM grid to allow a qualitative analysis of the in-plane texture of the samples is described and used to analyze the microstructure of these samples. The microstructure and particularly the texture are correlated with the anisotropy constant (K_(AF)) of the antiferromagnet (AF) layer, with an optimum NiCr seed layer of 6 nm to give a maximum value of K_(AF) of 1.2× 10~7 ergs/cc.