Interfacial perpendicular magnetic anisotropy and magnetic properties of Pd/Co2FeAl0.5Si0.5/MgO structured films

Abstract A series of Co 2 FeAl 0.5 Si 0.5 (CFAS) films sandwiched by Pd and MgO layers are sputtered and subsequently annealed at various temperatures. Perpendicular magnetic anisotropy is shown to build in the structures with CFAS thickness ranging from 3 to 4.25 nm after annealing. The thickness of a magnetic dead layer and the saturation magnetization are shown to increase with the annealing temperature. Perpendicular magnetic anisotropy is determined to be of 1–2 × 10 6  erg/cm 3 . The plot of thickness dependent anisotropy indicates that the perpendicular anisotropy is contributed by the interfacial anisotropy, which is estimated to be 1.03 erg/cm 2 for the structures annealed at 300 °C. The positive contributions to the PMA made by the interfaces of CFAS/MgO and Pd/CFAS are also identified. Our results provide some useful information on the design and integration of CFAS into the next generation of spintronic devices.