Magnetization dynamics in thin films and multilayers

The behavior of spin waves is influenced by essentially all the parameters which characterize a magnetic material - exchange interactions, anisotropy, surface effects, dipolar interactions, phase transitions and imperfections . Thus measurements of spin wave frequencies can give important information on characterizing different magnetic materials and structures. In this pap er we outline the major results and calculational methods for long-waveleng th spin waves in thin films and multilayers. While the primary attention is on ferromagnet-based structures, long-wavelength spin waves in antiferroma gnets are also discussed. We indicate how particular measurements of spin w ave frequencies can be used to extract the fundamental parameters of the di fferent structures. (C) 1999 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.