Modification of the magnetic properties of Fe/Cr(001) by controlling the compensation of a vicinal Cr(001) surface

The degree of compensation of a normally uncompensated Cr(001) surface is c ontrolled by using a curved substrate with steps parallel to the [100] dire ction. In this way, the degree of frustration caused by steps at the interf ace between an Fe overlayer and the Cr substrate can be systematically vari ed. Previous work on flat Cr(001) at temperatures below the Cr ordering tem perature (311 K) has identified a critical Fe thickness of similar to 35-38 Angstrom, below which the Fe films display a reduced remanence. For our cu rved Cr substrate, below this critical Fe thickness three phases are observ ed for low (<similar to 2.5 degrees), intermediate and high (>similar to 5 degrees) miscut angle respectively: (i) multidomain; (ii) single domain wit h magnetization perpendicular to the step edges; and (iii) single domain wi th magnetization parallel to the step edges. At the same temperature, for F e films above the critical thickness, region (i) disappears and only region s (ii) and (iii) remain. In a second experiment, the adsorption of submonol ayer Au on the Fe is observed to increase the strength of the step-induced anisotropy and accordingly vary the position of the transition from regions (ii) to (iii). (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S0021-8979(99)3990 8-4].