Anomalous magneto-optical behavior of uniaxial Co/CoO bilayer films

详细信息    查看全文

• 作者：J.B. Gonz¨¢lez-D¨ªaz ; J.A. Arregi ; E. Bergaretxe ; M.J. Fertin ; O. Idigoras ; A. Berger
• 关键词：Generalized magneto-optical ellipsometry ; Ellipsometry ; Birefringence ; Optical anisotropy ; Magneto-optics
• 刊名：Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials
• 出版年：2013
• 出版时间：January, 2013
• 年：2013
• 卷：325
• 期：Complete
• 页码：147-151
• 全文大小：453 K

文摘

We study the magneto-optical properties of thin epitaxially grown Co/CoO bilayer films with in-plane uniaxial anisotropy by means of Magneto-Optical Kerr Effect (MOKE) measurements. The magneto-optical response obtained from these samples exhibits a surprising and atypical behavior, in that the polarizer setting, at which signal inversion occurs, is a function of the sample orientation. This behavior even occurs for identical orientations of the magnetization with respect to the plane-of-incidence. Using Generalized Magneto-Optical Ellipsometry, we show that the origin of this behavior is the presence of optical anisotropy, which we attribute to the strained epitaxial CoO overlayer in our samples.