The atomistic origin of the athermal training effect in granular IrMn/CoFe bilayers

TL;DR

This study uses atomistic modeling to reveal how interfacial mixing and metastable spin states cause the athermal training effect in granular IrMn/CoFe bilayers, impacting the design of antiferromagnetic spintronic devices.

Contribution

The paper introduces an atomistic spin model that explains the microscopic origin of the athermal training effect in exchange biased systems, emphasizing the role of interfacial mixing and metastable spins.

Findings

Interfacial mixing increases exchange bias, switching field, and coercivity.

Metastable spin states cause irreversible behavior after the first cycle.

The athermal training effect results from spins settling into a reversible ground state.

Abstract

Anti-ferromagnetic materials have the possibility to offer ultra fast, high data density spintronic devices. A significant challenge is the reliable detection of the state of the antiferromagnet, which can be achieved using exchange bias. Here we develop an atomistic spin model of the athermal training effect, a well known phenomenon in exchange biased systems where the bias is significantly reduced after the first hysteresis cycle. We find that the setting process in granular thin films relies on the presence of interfacial mixing between the ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic layers. We systematically investigate the effect of the intermixing and find that the exchange bias, switching field and coercivity all increase with increased intermixing. The interfacial spin state is highly frustrated leading to a systematic decrease in interfacial ordering of the ferromagnet. This metastable spin structure of initially irreversible spins leads to a large effective exchange coupling and thus large increase in the switching field. After the first hysteresis cycle these metastable spins drop into a reversible ground state that is repeatable for all subsequent hysteresis cycles, demonstrating that the effect is truly athermal. Our simulations provide new insights into the role of interface mixing and the importance of metastable spin structures in exchange biased systems which could help with the design an optimisation of antiferromagnetic spintronic devices.