Application of magneto-optical Kerr effect to first-order reversal curve measurements

First-order reversal curves (FORC) are a powerful method for magnetic sample characterization, separating all magnetic states of an investigated system according to their coercivity and internal magnetic interactions. A major drawback of using measurement techniques like VSM or SQUID, typically applied for FORC acquisition, is the long measurement time, limiting the resolution and the number of measurements due to time constraints. Faster techniques like MOKE result in problems regarding measurement stability over the curse of the acquisition of many minor loops, due to drift and non-absolute magnetization values. Here, we present an approach using a specialized field shape providing two anchor points for each minor loop for applying the magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE) technique to FORC measurements. This results in a high field resolution while keeping the total acquisition time to only a few minutes. MOKE FORC measurements are exemplarily applied to a simple permalloy film, an exchange-bias system, and a Gd/Fe multilayer system with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy, showcasing the versatility of the method. (C) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.