Plasmonic layer-selective all-optical switching of magnetization with nanometer resolution.

ABSTRACT: All-optical magnetization reversal with femtosecond laser pulses facilitates the fastest and least dissipative magnetic recording, but writing magnetic bits with spatial resolution better than the wavelength of light has so far been seen as a major challenge. Here, we demonstrate that a single femtosecond laser pulse of wavelength 800?nm can be used to toggle the magnetization exclusively within one of two 10-nm thick magnetic nanolayers, separated by just 80?nm, without affecting the other one. The choice of the addressed layer is enabled by the excitation of a plasmon-polariton at a targeted interface of the nanostructure, and realized merely by rotating the polarization-axis of the linearly-polarized ultrashort optical pulse by 90°. Our results unveil a robust tool that can be deployed to reliably switch magnetization in targeted nanolayers of heterostructures, and paves the way to increasing the storage density of opto-magnetic recording by a factor of at least 2.

SUBMITTER: Ignatyeva DO 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6803660 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature