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Extracting weak magnetic contrast from complex background contrast in plan-view FeGe thin films
Binbin Wang1, Núria Bagués2, Tao Liu3
1Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The Ohio State University, OH 43210, United States; Center for Electron Microscopy and Analysis, The Ohio State University, OH 43212, United States.
Ultramicroscopy
|October 15, 2021
Summary
Characterizing magnetic textures in thin films is crucial for skyrmion-based devices. New methods successfully image magnetic phases in plan-view samples, overcoming previous imaging challenges.
Area of Science:
- Materials Science
- Condensed Matter Physics
- Nanotechnology
Background:
- Designing skyrmion-based devices requires characterizing magnetic textures in functional thin films.
- Lorentz transmission electron microscopy (LTEM) and Lorentz scanning transmission electron microscopy (LSTEM) are standard techniques.
- Imaging magnetic textures in thin ( < 50 nm) plan-view films is challenging due to complex background contrast and specimen bending.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and explore methods for extracting magnetic contrast from plan-view thin films.
- To enable direct imaging of magnetic textures in challenging thin film samples.
Main Methods:
- Defocused LTEM image background subtraction.
- Coherentdiffractive imaging (CoM-DPC) reconstruction from LSTEM datasets with frequency filtering.
- Registration of 4D-STEM datasets acquired at different sample tilt angles.
Main Results:
- Successfully extracted magnetic contrast from a 35 nm plan-view FeGe thin film.
- Achieved real-space imaging of both helical and skyrmion magnetic phases.
- Demonstrated the effectiveness of the three explored methods for plan-view magnetic imaging.
Conclusions:
- The developed methods overcome challenges in imaging nanoscale magnetic behavior in plan-view thin films.
- This advancement is a fundamental step towards developing highly integrated spin electronic devices.
- Accurate characterization of magnetic textures is key for future spintronic applications.
