Extraction of short time intrinsic switching field distributions in perpendicular media

The effects of thermal fluctuations are characterized in granular perpendicular media of two different grain sizes. We extract short time switching fields H-0 and intrinsic switching field distributions and find that after correcting for thermal effects and the demagnetizing fields, the switching field distributions are almost independent of grain size, in contrast to the long time scale behavior with broader distributions observed for the small grain media. In addition, the shape anisotropy fields of the magnetic clusters are shown to decrease the observed Ho and are more significant as grain size is reduced. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3673846]