Soft X-ray resonant magnetic scattering study of magnetization reversal in low dimensional magnetic heterostructures Jorge Miguel a,1 , Julio Camarero b, * , Jan Vogel c , Joost F. Peters a,2 , Nick B. Brookes d , Jeroen B. Goedkoop a a Van der Waals-Zeeman Institute, University of Amsterdam, 1018 XE Amsterdam, The Netherlands b Dpto. de Fı ´sica de la Materia Condensada Universidad Auto ´noma de Madrid, 28049 Madrid, Spain c Institut Ne ´el-CNRS, 25 Avenue des Martyrs, BP 166, F-38042 Grenoble Cedex 9, France d European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF), 38043 Grenoble, France Available online 19 July 2007 Abstract Soft X-ray resonant magnetic scattering (SXRMS) has been used to investigate the microscopic magnetization reversal behavior of complex magnetic systems. SXRMS is a unique technique, providing chemical, spatial and magnetic sensitivity, which is not affected by external magnetic fields. The study of two selected thin magnetic heterostructures is presented, amorphous rare-earth transition metal alloys and perpendicular exchange coupled antiferromagnetic/ferromagnetic films. In the first system, the internal structure of magnetic stripe domains on nanometer length scales is obtained by measuring bi-dimensional (2D) scattering images. In the second system, the element specificity is exploited to identify the role of the uncompensated spins in the antiferromagnetic layer on the exchange coupling phenomena. Future trends are also discussed. # 2007 Published by Elsevier B.V. PACS : 75.70.Cn; 75.60.Jk; 75.30.Et; 75.50.Ee; 78.70.Dm; 07.85.Qe Keywords: Magnetic properties of interfaces, multilayers, superlattices, heterostructures; Exchange and superexchange interactions; Antiferromagnetics; Magnetization reversal mechanisms; X-ray absorption spectra; Synchrotron radiation instrumentation 1. Introduction The study of magnetization reversal is an essential issue for the future of spintronics. Central to nanomagnetism investiga- tions are hysteresis and magnetization reversal processes, which control the responses of magnetization to magnetic fields. On the other hand, current and future applications related to nanomagnetism in general consist of more than one magnetic component [1] and, usually, their resulting properties are not simply additive. New experimental tools which can test the magnetic properties of each component independently within the complex system have to be added to the toolkit of standard magnetic characterization methods. The understanding and control of the magnetization reversal behavior could be the first step towards the development of spintronic devices with custom-chosen properties. Only very few experimental techniques can address the microscopic magnetic properties of the different magnetic layers in a multilayered system with element selectivity. All of them are synchrotron-based techniques and exploit the strong magneto-optical contrast at the specific X-ray absorption transitions [2]. The soft X-ray range, with wavelengths between 1 and 2 nm, hosts the largest resonances of the magnetically important transition-metal and rare-earth series. For instance, photoelectron emission microscopy (PEEM) combined with X- ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD) has already proven its versatility for the layer-resolved investigation of micro- scopic magnetic domains in multilayered magnetic samples in their remanent state [3] or under applied magnetic fields in microscopic areas [4]. With macroscopic fields, photon-in photon-out techniques such as transmission X-ray microscopy www.elsevier.com/locate/apsusc Applied Surface Science 254 (2007) 335–338 * Corresponding author. E-mail address: julio.camarero@uam.es (J. Camarero). 1 Present address: Institut fu ¨r Experimentalphysik, Freie Universita ¨t Berlin, D-14195 Berlin, Germany. 2 Present address: Philips Medical Systems, P.O. Box 10.000, 5680 DA Best, The Netherlands. 0169-4332/$ – see front matter # 2007 Published by Elsevier B.V. doi:10.1016/j.apsusc.2007.07.103