PERPENDICULAR MAGNETIZATION IN ULTRATHIN ELECTRODEPOSITED COBALT FILMS

Electrodeposited ultrathin cobalt films on Au(lll) covered with a prot ective copper film can show perpendicular magnetization exactly like t heir ultrahigh-vacuum-grown counterparts. At high deposition rates of cobalt, out-of-plane magnetization is stabilized in the thickness rang e from 2 to 8 atomic layers while low deposition rates favor in-plane magnetization at any thickness. The cobalt films possess hcp structure with the c axis perpendicular to the Au(111) plane. The technique is versatile and leads to quality standards comparable to those obtained by molecular-beam epitaxy, but at a much lower cost.