IUVSTA 15th International Vacuum Congress (IVC-15), AVS 48th International Symposium (AVS-48), 11th International Conference on Solid Surfaces (ICSS-11)
    Thin Films Monday Sessions
       Session TF-MoP

Paper TF-MoP2
The Role of Interfaces in Fe/W and Co/W Multilayers

Monday, October 29, 2001, 5:30 pm, Room 134/135

Session: Multilayers and Thin Film Characterization Poster Session
Presenter: E. Majkova, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
Authors: E. Majkova, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
A. Anopchenko, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
Y. Chushkin, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
M. Jergel, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
S. Luby, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
R. Senderak, Institute of Physics SAS, Slovak Republic
Correspondent: Click to Email
With GMR multilayers (MLs) the attention has been mostly paid to the combinations of transition metals with Ag, Au and Cu. Due to the immiscibility of constituents the multilayer interfaces are chemically sharp, formation of magnetically dead layers at the interfaces is suppressed and electron transport does not suffer from additional scattering phenomena. For applications, the use of refractory metals (W, Mo) as non- magnetic spacer provides an interesting alternative. In this paper the interfaces in e-beam deposited Fe/W and Co/W multilayers (MLs) with 5 and 10 periods and magnetic layers 1 or 2nm thick are studied. For analyses the X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray reflectivity (XRR) and diffuse scattering at grazing incidence (GIXDS) completed by simulations of the spectra were used. All MLs showed regular periodic structure with layer thicknesses close to the nominal values. The interfacial roughness was 0.5-0.7nm, slightly higher for W/on- Co or W/on -Fe interfaces. >From the GIDS spectra vertical correlation of the interfaces across the whole ML stack was obtained. The XRD patterns revealed polycrystalline structure of the Fe, Co and W layers with structural coherency between fcc Co(111) and/or bcc Fe(110) and bcc W(110) lattice planes across the ML stack. The coherency is affected by the lateral waviness of the Fe/W or Co/W interfaces what results in relatively wide angular distribution of the column orientation. The data point at the growth induced mixing and roughness at the ML interfaces. There is no evidence of compound formation at the interfaces even at the deposition at elevated temperatures (<=200C). The miscibility of Co/W and Fe/W systems and the possible formation of magnetically dead layers due to the mixing and/or roughness at Fe/W and Co/W interfaces are discussed.