Abstract
In this chapter depth-sensitive magneto-optical microscopy, based on the conventional Kerr-, Voigt- and gradient effects, is reviewed. Following some experimental aspects of conventional magneto-optical microscopy and magnetometry in Sect. 3.1, the main part of the chapter (Sect. 3.2) is devoted to the depth sensitivity of the Kerr effect. Experimental depth-selective Kerr microscopy will then be presented in Sect. 3.3, followed by a section on Voigt and gradient microscopy and their favorable application on multilayer films (Sect. 3.4).
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- 1.
In a medium of constant refractive index \(n\), the “optical” path length for a path of physical length \(d\) is \(nd\). A wave that travels a path of given optical path length arrives with the same phase shift as if it had traveled a path of that physical length in vacuum [166].
- 2.
- 3.
Note that the conjugate complex of (3.16) has to be plotted to obtain the same curves as in the first publications [177, 193]. This is owed to the fact that in these articles the Atkinson-Lissberger sign convention [162] was not used.
- 4.
The perturbation calculation takes over the concept that was already introduced in Sect. 2.4.2: the total electromagnetic amplitude can be described as a superposition of a magnetically unaffected, primary light field (without the magneto-optical terms, called normally reflected amplitude \(R_\mathrm {N}\) or \(A_\mathrm {N}\) in Sect. 2.4.2) and a magnetically induced perturbation contribution (the magneto-optical amplitude \(R_\mathrm {K}\) or \(A_\mathrm {K}\) in the previous nomenclature).
- 5.
In practice, compensator and analyser are rotated “simultaneously” until the desired sensitivity is obtained.
- 6.
A feasible alternative method was found by L. Lokamani (IFW Dresden): instead of using a compensator, Lokamani obtained layer selectivity by rotating polarizer and analyser relative to each other. If the polarizer is out of the (standard) \(s\)- or \(p\)-direction, elliptical light is generated by reflection on any metal (see Sect. 2.2.5). The degree and sign of ellipticity depends on the polarizer angle. So instead of shifting the phase between regular- and Kerr component in the reflected light with a compensator, a suitable phase shift between these two light components can as well be obtained by making use of the “natural” phase shift between \(s\)- and \(p\)-component that occurs under off-axis polarization conditions.
- 7.
Note that different hysteresis properties are not required for layer selective imaging based on the X ray dichroism methods presented in Chaps. 4 and 5. As these effects exhibit an inherent elemental specificity, layer selectivity can be readily achieved if the individual layers of a multilayer stack differ in their elemental composition. On the other hand, if the individual layers are of the same composition, layer selectivity can only be obtained with the interference-based approaches presented in this chapter.
- 8.
In [183] empirical information depth profiles for the Voigt effects (intrinsic and gyroelectric) were derived by similar analysis as shown for the Kerr effect in Sect. 3.2.4. For details we refer to this paper.
- 9.
A domain wall is free of magnetic charge (“pole-free”) if the normal components of magnetization on both sides of a wall are the same [111].
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Kuch, W., Schäfer, R., Fischer, P., Hillebrecht, F.U. (2015). Depth-Sensitive Conventional Magneto-Optical Microscopy. In: Magnetic Microscopy of Layered Structures. Springer Series in Surface Sciences, vol 57. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-44532-7_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-44532-7_3
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