Giant magnetoresistance dependence on the lateral correlation length of the interface roughness in magnetic superlattices

R. Schad; P. Beliën; G. Verbanck; V. V. Moshchalkov; Y. Bruynseraede; H. E. Fischer; S. Lefebvre; M. Bessiere

doi:10.1103/PhysRevB.59.1242

Giant magnetoresistance dependence on the lateral correlation length of the interface roughness in magnetic superlattices

R. Schad, P. Beliën, G. Verbanck, V. V. Moshchalkov, Y. Bruynseraede, H. E. Fischer, S. Lefebvre, and M. Bessiere

Phys. Rev. B 59, 1242 – Published 1 January 1999

Abstract

The giant magnetoresistance (GMR) observed in magnetic multilayers, is due to spin-dependent electron transport. In order to study the influence of the interface roughness on the spin-dependent scattering we produced epitaxial Fe/Cr(001) superlattices with negligible bulk scattering. The interface roughness was varied by carefully annealing the samples. The vertical and lateral interface roughness components were quantitatively determined by specular and diffuse synchrotron x-ray diffraction using anomalous scattering. We find that the magnitude of the GMR effect increases with decreasing lateral correlation length $ξ_{x}$ and increasing vertical roughness amplitude η.

Received 2 March 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.59.1242

Authors & Affiliations

R. Schad^*

Research Institute for Materials, KU Nijmegen, NL-6525 ED Nijmegen, The Netherlands

P. Beliën^†, G. Verbanck, V. V. Moshchalkov, and Y. Bruynseraede

Laboratorium voor Vaste-Stoffysika en Magnetisme, KU Leuven, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium

H. E. Fischer

Institute Laue Langevin, 38042 Grenoble Cedex 9, France

S. Lefebvre and M. Bessiere

LURE, Université de Paris-Sud, 91405 Orsay Cedex, France

^*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Present address: University of Alabama, Center for Materials for Information Technology, Box 870209, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487. FAX: +1 205 3482346. Electronic address: rschad@bama.49.edu
^†Present address: Philips Optical Storage, Kempische Steenweg 293, 3500 Hasselt, Belgium.

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Vol. 59, Iss. 2 — 1 January 1999

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Physical Review B

covering condensed matter and materials physics