Abstract
Controlling the position of a magnetic domain wall with electric current1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11 may allow for new types of non-volatile memory and logic devices10,12,13,14. To be practical, however, the threshold current density necessary for domain wall motion must be reduced below present values. Intrinsic pinning due to magnetic anisotropy2, as recently observed in perpendicularly magnetized Co/Ni nanowires15, has been shown to give rise to an intrinsic current threshold Jth0. Here, we show that domain wall motion can be induced at current densities 40% below Jth0 when an external magnetic field of the order of the domain wall pinning field is applied. We observe that the velocity of the domain wall motion is the vector sum of current- and field-induced velocities, and that the domain wall can be driven against the direction of a magnetic field as large as 2,000 Oe, even at currents below Jth0. We show that this counterintuitive phenomenon is triggered by Walker breakdown16, and that the additive velocities provide a unique way of simultaneously determining the spin polarization of current and the Gilbert damping constant.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$259.00 per year
only $21.58 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Berger, L. Exchange interaction between ferromagnetic domain wall and electric current in thin metallic films. J. Appl. Phys. 55, 1954–1956 (1984).
Tatara, G. & Kohno, H. Theory of current-driven domain wall motion: spin transfer versus momentum transfer. Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 086601 (2004).
Thiaville, A., Nakatani, Y., Miltat, J. & Suzuki, Y. Micromagnetic understanding of current-driven domain wall motion in patterned nanowires. Europhys. Lett. 69, 990–996 (2005).
Yamaguchi, A. et al. Real-space observation of current-driven domain wall motion in submicron magnetic wires. Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 077205 (2004).
Yamanouchi, M., Chiba, D., Matsukura, F. & Ohno, H. Current-induced domain-wall switching in a ferromagnetic semiconductor structure. Nature 428, 539–542 (2004).
Vernier, N., Allwood, D. A., Atkinson, D., Cooke, M. D. & Cowburn, R. P. Domain wall propagation in magnetic nanowires by spin-polarized current injection. Europhys. Lett. 65, 526–532 (2004).
Kläui, M. et al. Controlled and reproducible domain wall displacement by current pulses injected into ferromagnetic ring structures. Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 106601 (2005).
Yamaguchi, A. et al. Effect of Joule heating in current-driven domain wall motion. Appl. Phys. Lett. 86, 012511 (2005).
Thomas, L. et al. Oscillatory dependence of current-driven magnetic domain wall motion on current pulse length. Nature 443, 197–200 (2006).
Parkin, S. S. P., Hayashi, M. & Thomas, L. Magnetic domain-wall racetrack memory. Science 320, 190–194 (2008).
Miron, I. M. et al. Fast current-induced domain-wall motion controlled by the Rashba effect. Nature Mater. 10, 419–423 (2011).
Allwood, D. A. et al. Magnetic domain-wall logic. Science 309, 1688–1692 (2005).
Hayashi, M., Thomas, L., Moriya, R., Rettner, C. & Parkin, S. S. P. Current-controlled magnetic domain-wall nanowire shift register. Science 320, 209–211 (2008).
Fukami, S. et al. Low-current perpendicular domain wall motion cell for scalable high-speed MRAM. 2009 Symposium on VLSI Technology. Digest Tech. Pap. 230 (2009).
Koyama, T. et al. Observation of the intrinsic pinning of a magnetic domain wall in a ferromagnetic nanowire. Nature Mater. 10, 194–197 (2011).
Schryer, N. L. & Walker, L. R. Motion of 180 degrees domain-walls in uniform dc magnetic-fields. J. Appl. Phys. 45, 5406–5421 (1974).
Lee, J.-C. et al. Universality class of magnetic domain wall motion. Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 067201 (2011).
Li, S., Nakamura, H., Kanazawa, T., Liu, X. & Morisako, A. Current-induced domain wall motion in TbFeCo wires with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. IEEE Trans. Magn. 46, 1695 (2010).
Ngo, D.-T., Ikeda, K. & Awano, H. Direct observation of domain wall motion induced by low-current-density in TbFeCo wires. Appl. Phys. Exp. 4, 093002 (2011).
Chiba, D. et al. Control of multiple magnetic domain walls by current in a Co/Ni nano-wire. Appl. Phys. Exp. 3, 073004 (2010).
Tanigawa, H. et al. Domain wall motion induced by electrical current in structured Co/Ni wire with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. Appl. Phys. Exp. 1, 101303 (2009).
Nakatani, Y., Thiaville, A. & Miltat, J. Faster magnetic walls in rough wires. Nature Mater. 2, 521–523 (2003).
Yamanouchi, M., Chiba, D., Matsukura, F., Dietl, T. & Ohno, H. Velocity of domain-wall motion induced by electrical current in the ferromagnetic semiconductor (Ga,Mn)As. Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 096601 (2006).
Yamada, K. et al. Influence of instabilities on high-field magnetic domain wall velocity in (Co/Ni) nanostrips. Appl. Phys. Exp. 4, 113001 (2011).
Hayashi, M. et al. Influence of current on field-driven domain wall motion i permalloy nanowires from time resolved measurement of anisotropic magnetoresistance. Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 197207 (2006).
Mizukami, S. et al. Gilbert damping in Ni/Co multilayer films exhibiting large perpendicular anisotropy. Appl. Phys. Exp. 4, 013005 (2011).
Burrowes, C. et al. Non-adiabatic spin torques in narrow magnetic domain walls. Nature Phys. 6, 17–21 (2009).
Acknowledgements
This work was partly supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (S) and ‘Funding program for world-leading innovative R&D on science and technology’ (FIRST program) from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Collaborative Research Program of Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
S.F. and N.I. supplied the Co/Ni films. T.K., K.U. and Y.Y. fabricated the sample. T.K. designed the experimental set-up and collected all data. K.Y. and J.-P.J. performed the MOKE measurement. S.M. performed the TRMOKE measurement. Y.N. performed the simulation. D.C., K.Kobayashi and T.O. planned and supervised the study. T.K., K.Kim, D.C., A.T., H.K., K.Kobayashi and T.O. wrote the manuscript. All authors discussed the results.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing financial interests.
Supplementary information
Supplementary information
Supplementary information (PDF 1282 kb)
Supplementary Movie S1
Supplementary Movie S1 (MOV 980 kb)
Supplementary Movie S2
Supplementary Movie S2 (MOV 978 kb)
Supplementary Movie S3
Supplementary Movie S3 (MOV 992 kb)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Koyama, T., Ueda, K., Kim, KJ. et al. Current-induced magnetic domain wall motion below intrinsic threshold triggered by Walker breakdown. Nature Nanotech 7, 635–639 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2012.151
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2012.151
This article is cited by
-
Magnetism modulation in Co3Sn2S2 by current-assisted domain wall motion
Nature Electronics (2022)
-
Bidirectional propagation of tilting domain walls in perpendicularly magnetized T shaped structure with the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction
Scientific Reports (2018)
-
A spin torque meter with magnetic facet domains
Nature Communications (2018)
-
Nanometric alternating magnetic field generator
Scientific Reports (2017)
-
Field-driven domain wall motion under a bias current in the creep and flow regimes in Pt/[CoSiB/Pt]N nanowires
Scientific Reports (2016)