Domain wall coupling and collective switching in interacting mesoscopic ring magnet arrays -: art. no. 032504

The effects of magnetostatic domain wall coupling on the magnetic switching are investigated for micrometer-sized cobalt ring arrays with edge-to-edge spacings varying between 80 nm and 8 mum. The various transitions between the different equilibrium states in rings are affected differently with increasing magnetostatic interaction (leading to an increased or reduced switching field) depending on the details of the particular switching mechanism. The switching field distribution width is strongly reduced for narrowly spaced ring arrays due to collective switching between adjacent rings where the domain walls couple magnetostatically. The interaction is found to increase with increasing film thickness due to the increased stray field. (C) 2005 American Institute of Physics.