Magnetic switching of ferromagnetic thin films under thermal perturbation

In this paper, we study the magnetic switching of submicron-sized ferromagnetic thin films under thermal noise and external field. It is shown that the presence of the noise makes the switching easier with weaker external fields and induces more intermediate metastable states in the switching pathways. Different switching pathways are preferred at different temperatures. A quantitative relation between the temperature and the switching field for different metastable states is given through an adjusted Arrhenius formula near the critical field. Based on this, preferred switching pathways at different temperatures are obtained by comparing the energy barriers along different pathways. © 2005 American Institute of Physics. DOI: 10.1063/1.1988971