Correlation of process parameters with morphology and magnetic properties of Co-based amorphous, soft, thin films

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Abstract
The in-plane, dipolar anisotropy of a soft magnetic thin film with columnar growth features is thought to result from the alignment and eccentricity of the column cross sections. This anisotropy can be reduced either by randomizing the alignment of the elliptic axes or by reducing the eccentricity. To determine the origin of the reductions produced by processing variations, we image processed micrographs from transmission electron microscope (TEM) of sequentially sputtered, amorphous CoB alloy thin films, and correlated their in-plane magnetic anisotropies with the statistics of the nanoscale features in their morphologies. The results confirmed that the in-plane anisotropies were dominated by correlations in the alignment of the major axes of the anisotropic growth features. Reduced anisotropies were observed in obliquely deposited films grown under the influence of a substrate bias, even though the eccentricity in their growth features was significantly increased. The effect of the increased eccentricity was apparently overcompensated by a randomization in the orientation of the features of the relaxed film structures.