Origin of shape anisotropy effects in solution-phase synthesized FePt nanomagnets

Abstract

Controlling the morphology of inorganic nanocrystals is important because many of their electronic attributes are highly sensitive to shape and aspect ratio. FePt nanocrystals have potential as advanced magnetic materials for ultrahigh-density memory. This is due to their high shape and/or magnetocrystalline anisotropy, which allows bits as small as 3 nm to be thermally stable over typical data storage periods of 10 years. Herein, nanocrystals were simply fabricated by simultaneous reduction of platinum acetylacetonate and thermal decomposition of iron pentacarbonyl in properly chosen conditions of solvent/surfactant proportions and temperature for rational design of their shape and magnetic properties. This work has combined magnetometry measurements and micromagnetic simulations to illustrate the role of the external shape on the rotation of the magnetization vector for colloidal assemblies. © 2011 American Institute of Physics.