Dittschar, A., Zharnikov, M., Kuch, W., Lin, M.-T., Schneider, C. M., Kirschner, J.
Composition-driven spin-reorientation transition in ferromagnetic alloy films
Physical Review B 57, (6),pp R3209-R3212 (1998)
A spin-reorientation transition upon a variation of the Fe concentration x is observed in ultrathin fcc FexCo1− x alloy films on Cu(001) for x > 77% . For film thicknesses below 4 monolayers the magnetic easy axis changes from in-plane on the Co-rich side to out-of-plane on the Fe-rich side. Since no structural transitions accompany this spin-reorientation transition, varying the alloy composition can be interpreted as varying the number of 3d electrons. Upon changing the average d-band filling by as little as 0.1 electron strong changes of the anisotropy energy are observed.
ki-1998-c03