High Resolution Tips for Switching Magnetization MFM |
| M. Precner, J. Fedor, J. Tóbik, J. Šoltýs, V. Cambel
Institute of Electrical Engineering, Slovak academy of Sciences, Bratislava, 841 04 Slovak Republic |
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| Switching magnetization magnetic force microscopy (SM-MFM) is based on two-pass magnetic force microscopy with opposite orientation of tip magnetization between two scans. The sum of the scanned data with reversed tip magnetization depicts local van der Waals forces, and their difference maps the local magnetic forces. Tip magnetization can be easily reversed in external magnetic field during the scanning. The separation of the forces mapped enables scanning in close proximity of the sample (~5 nm). Therefore, extremely high spatial resolution (10 nm) is achievable by the SM-MFM. Image phase resolution of the MFM method depends on various geometric parameters of the tip, such as tip length, its apex radius and taper angle. The parameters are determined by the evaporation process, within which the standard atomic force microscopy tips are coated with magnetic layer. In this work we show that the thickness of the coated layer is important for the SM-MFM spatial resolution. |
DOI: 10.12693/APhysPolA.126.386 PACS numbers: 75.75.+a, 75.70.-i, 68.37.Rt, 75.60.Jk, 81.15.Ef, 02.30.Nw |