Local coercivity at X-ray nanobeam irradiated regions in amorphous Fe80B20 stripes

Abstract

We report on the effect, on the local magnetization reversal taking place in amorphous Fe80B20 stripes, of the irradiation with nanobeam synchrotron X-ray. That irradiation preserves the amorphous structure and results on the increase of the local coercivity with respect to that measured in a non-irradiated sample, in which the coercivity is mediated by the nucleation-propagation of a single wall. The local coercivity increases in a non-linear way with the width of the irradiated regions when that width is smaller than that of the wall mediating the magnetization switching in the non-irradiated stripe and gets saturated when the irradiated regions dimension is larger than the propagating wall width. We correlate this behavior with the induction at the irradiated regions of a reduction of the local effective anisotropy with respect to the stripe as-lithographed value. From the relationship between the coercivity and the width of the irradiated regions we estimate the local anisotropy reduction in a 25% of that measured in the non-irradiated stripe.