Study of the magnetoelastic effect in nickel and cobalt thin films at GHz range using x-ray microscopy

Abstract

We use surface acoustic waves of 1 and 3 GHz in hybrid piezoelectric-magnetic systems with either nickel or cobalt as a magnetic layer to generate magnetoacoustic waves and directly image them using stroboscopic x-ray magnetic circular dichroism imaging. Our measurements visualize and quantify the amplitudes of both acoustic and magnetic components of the magnetoacoustic waves, which are generated in the ferromagnetic layer and can propagate over millimeter distances. Additionally, we quantified the magnetoelastic strain component for nickel and cobalt through micromagnetic simulations.