Controlling the magnetization reversal process of magnetic elements isimportant for a wide range of applications that make use of magnetoresistiveeffects, but is difficult to achieve for devices that require adjacent thinfilm structures capable of contacting an individual molecule or quantum dot. Wereport on the fabrication and measurement of ferromagnetic break junctiondevices with planar, elliptical leads to address the particular challenge ofcontrolling the relative magnetization alignment between neighboringelectrodes. Low temperature transport measurements, supported by finite-elementmicromagnetic simulations, are used to characterize the magnetoresistanceresponse across a range of conductance levels. We demonstrate that an in-planeexternal field applied parallel to the hard axis of the ellipses may be used tocontrollably switch the magnetization of the source and drain electrodesbetween monodomain-like parallel and antiparallel configurations for devices inthe tunneling regime.
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