Magnetization reversal process in Fe/Si (001) single-crystalline film investigated by planar Hall effect

A planar Hall effect (PHE) is introduced to investigate the magnetization reversal process in single-crystalline iron film grown on a Si (001) substrate. Owing to the domain structure of iron film and the characteristics of PHE, the magnetization switches sharply in an angular range of the external field for two steps of 90 degrees domain wall displacement and one step of 180 degrees domain wall displacement near the easy axis, respectively. However, the magnetization reversal process near the hard axis is completed by only one step of 90 degrees domain wall displacement and then rotates coherently. The magnetization reversal process mechanism near the hard axis seems to be a combination of coherent rotation and domain wall displacement. Furthermore, the domain wall pinning energy and uniaxial magnetic anisotropy energy can also be derived from the PHE measurement.