Magnetism of rare-earth–transition-metal nanoscale multilayers. I. Experiments on Dy/Co, Dy/Fe, and Tb/Fe

Experimental investigations of magnetic and structural properties for rare-earth–transition-metal (RE-TM) compositionally modulated films (CMF) are presented in this paper. In particular, ${\mathit{A}}^{\mathrm{RE}}$/${\mathit{B}}^{\mathrm{TM}}$ including ${\mathit{A}}^{\mathrm{RE}}$=Dy and Tb and ${\mathit{B}}^{\mathrm{TM}}$=Fe, Co, and Ni, are studied. The layer thickness and temperature dependence of magnetic properties, which can be interpreted in terms of the antiferromagnetic coupling of RE and TM moments and their atomic distributions, are reported. These ${\mathit{A}}^{\mathrm{RE}}$/${\mathit{B}}^{\mathrm{TM}}$ CMF with nanoscale layer thicknesses exhibit perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) and the range of the layer thickness required for PMA is determined. The origin of PMA is also discussed.