Control of magnetic anisotropy and magnetic patterning of perpendicular Co/Pt multilayers by laser irradiation

We report an approach to altering the magnetic properties of 111 textured Co/Pt multilayer films grown on sapphire 0001 substrates in a controlled way using single-pulse laser irradiation. The as-grown films reveal a strong perpendicular magnetic anisotropy induced by interfacial anisotropy. We show that laser irradiation can chemically mix the multilayer structure particularly at the interfaces, hence reducing the perpendicular magnetic anisotropy and coercivity in a controlled manner depending on laser fluence. As a result, perpendicular films can also be magnetically patterned into hard and soft magnetic regions using a regular two-dimensional lattice of polystyrene particles acting as an array of microlenses. © 2006 American Institute of Physics. DOI: 10.1063/1.2161811