Magnetostatic interaction of glass-coated magnetic microwires

We report on tailoring the hysteresis loops of arrays containing Fe- and Co-rich microwires utilizing effects of magnetostatic coupling. The interacting wires of both types may produce a complex magnetic response and highly specific spectral characteristics. For Fe-rich microwires we observed step-wise hysteresis loops with a number of Barkhausen jumps equal to a number of Fe-rich microwires. For arrays of Co-based microwires the change in the hysteresis loop shape is less pronounced and is characterized by an increase in the magnetic anisotropy due to interwire interactions. The most interesting multistage magnetization behavior is obtained for arrays containing both types of wires and is characterized by field intervals with both gradual and abrupt magnetization changes. We also investigated the spectral properties associated with each type of magnetization process. The field plots for higher harmonics are highly specific and can be used to discriminate the types of wires in the array. (C) 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3429245]