A robust soliton ratchet using combined antiferromagnetic and ferromagnetic interlayer couplings

Abstract

A sharp magnetic soliton can be created and propagated in a vertical ratchet structure based on magnetic layers with out-of-plane anisotropy using a combination of antiferromagnetic and ferromagnetic interlayer couplings. This allows the use of identical magnetic layers in the stack, which simplifies the implementation of the ratchet compared to schemes which use alternating layer thicknesses. The ratchet behavior is analyzed using an Ising-macrospin approximation and conditions are derived for the propagation of a soliton, which is demonstrated experimentally. Values extracted from the experimental data for the coercivities and interlayer couplings show significant variation, which demonstrates the robustness of the soliton propagation.