Controlling the in-plane magnetocrystalline anisotropy and interfacial exchange coupling between ferromagnetic (FM) layers plays a key role in next-generation spintronic and magnetic memory devices. In this work, we explored the effect of tuning the magnetocrystalline anisotropy of La2/3Sr1/3CoO3 (LSCO) and La2/3Sr1/3MnO3 (LSMO) layers and the corresponding effect on interfacial exchange coupling by adjusting the thickness of the LSCO layer (tLSCO). The epitaxial LSCO/LSMO bilayers were grown on (110)o-oriented NdGaO3 (NGO) substrates with a fixed LSMO (top layer) thickness of 6 nm and LSCO (bottom layer) thicknesses varying from 1 to 10 nm. Despite the small difference (∼0.2%) in lattice mismatch between the two in-plane directions, [001]o and [11̅0]o, a pronounced in-plane magnetic anisotropy was observed. Soft X-ray magnetic circular dichroism hysteresis loops revealed that for tLSCO ≤ 4 nm, the easy axes for both LSCO and LSMO layers were along the [001]o direction, and the LSCO layer was characterized by magnetically active Co2+ ions that strongly coupled to the LSMO layer. No exchange bias effect was observed in the hysteresis loops. In contrast, along the [11̅0]o direction, the LSCO and LSMO layers displayed a small difference in their coercivity values, and a small exchange bias shift was observed. As tLSCO increased above 4 nm, the easy axis for the LSCO layer remained along the [100]o direction, but it gradually rotated to the [11̅0]o direction for the LSMO layer, resulting in a large negative exchange bias shift. Therefore, we provide a way to control the magnetocrystalline anisotropy and exchange bias by tuning the interfacial exchange coupling between the two FM layers.
Keywords: X-ray linear dichroism; X-ray magnetic circular dichroism; exchange bias; interface; magnetic anisotropy; perovskite oxides.