Strain Induced Vortex Core Switching in Planar Magnetostrictive Nanostructures

The dynamics of magnetic vortex cores is of great interest because the gyrotropic mode has applications in spin torque driven magnetic microwave oscillators, and also provides a means to flip the direction of the core for use in magnetic storage devices. Here, we propose a new means of stimulating magnetization reversal of the vortex core by applying a time-varying strain gradient to planar structures of the magnetostrictive material Fe81Ga19 (Galfenol), coupled to an underlying piezoelectric layer. Using micromagnetic simulations we have shown that the vortex core state can be deterministically reversed by electric field control of the time-dependent strain-induced anisotropy.