SURFACE MAGNETOOPTICAL KERR EFFECT FOR ULTRATHIN NI-FE BILAYERS

Surface magneto-optical Kerr effect is used to measure magnetic hysteresis loops for Ni-Fe bilayers previously studied by ferromagnetic resonance [Phys. Rev. 38, 12879 (1988)]. The approach to saturation in the [11] direction confirms the existence of enhanced fourfold in-plane magnetic anisotropy, attributed to the effect of arrays of misfit dislocations arising during the epitaxial growth of bcc Ni overlayers on ultrathin layers of bcc (001)Fe. The [11] magnetization curves for 10 monolayers (ML) of Ni on 7 ML of Fe shows a breaking of symmetry between positive and negative fields. This is ascribed to spin configurations frozen during growth.