Magnetic Properties of Fe(001) Thin Films on GaAs(001) Deposited by RF Magnetron Sputtering

Fe thin films, down to 6 nm thick, were prepared on GaAs(001) substrates by RF magnetron sputtering. The x-ray diffraction (XRD) analyses show that the epitaxial thin films of Fe(001) were grown with cube-on-cube orientation on GaAs(001). Magnetic properties were investigated by vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM) and ferromagnetic resonance (FMR) spectroscopy. The magnetization curves obtained by applying in-plane magnetic fields indicate that easy (hard) direction is along [100] ([110]) and the saturation magnetization is close to the bulk values. The in-plane magnetic anisotropy measured by FMR shows four-fold symmetry, as expected for bcc Fe. We did not observe the in-plane uniaxial magnetic anisotropy reported on the MBE-grown Fe films on GaAs substrates.