Formation of an intermetallic GdCo2 alloy on controlled annealing of a Gd/Co multilayer

Abstract One of the prospective routes for the formation of intermetallic composites is considered to be via annealing of heterostructures, which allows formation at a much lower temperature than the melting points of the individual elements. In this study, a binary alloy, GdCo2 was produced on the rapid annealing of a Gd/Co multilayer at 600 oC. Reflectivity measurements revealed that the entire Co layer intermixed with a large part of the Gd layer and formed a thick GdCo2 alloy layer with a magnetization of ∼ 225 emu/cc at room temperature. It was achieved due to the high interdiffusion of elements across interfaces of the Gd/Co multilayer upon annealing.