Physical Review B (Condensed Matter and Materials Physics) -- July 1, 1999 -- Volume 60, Issue 2 pp.
1216-1226 

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Surface/interface-roughness-induced demagnetizing effect in thin magnetic films

    Y.-P. Zhao 
    Department of Physics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy, and Center for Integrated Electronics and Electronics Manufacturing, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy,
    New York 12180-3590 

    G. Palasantzas 
    Department of Applied Physics, Materials Science Center, University of Groningen, Nijenborgh 4, 9747 AG Groningen, The Netherlands 

    G.-C. Wang 
    Department of Physics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy, and Center for Integrated Electronics and Electronics Manufacturing, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy,
    New York 12180-3590 

    J. Th. M. De Hosson 
    Department of Applied Physics, Materials Science Center, University of Groningen, Nijenborgh 4, 9747 AG Groningen, The Netherlands 

(Received 3 December 1998) 

We study the influence of surface/interface roughness on the demagnetizing factor of a thin magnetic film with a single or a double boundary
of self-affine, mound or anisotropic roughness. For a film with a single self-affine rough boundary, the in-plane demagnetizing factor Nxx(yy)
is proportional to the interface width w square and to the leading order is inversely proportional to the lateral correlation length . The
roughness exponent  is also shown to greatly affect Nxx(yy). For a film with a single mound boundary, Nxx(yy) is inversely proportional to the
apparent correlation length, and also depends on the ratio of the two different lateral lengths: the average mound separation  and the
randomness correlation length . It is also shown that an anisotropic surface morphology can induce anisotropic in-plane demagnetizing
factors. The demagnetizing anisotropy can be magnified by a morphological anisotropy. Furthermore, we consider films with two rough
boundaries. Besides a general formalism derived for the demagnetizing factor, we investigate how the cross correlation of the two rough
boundaries affects the in-plane demagnetizing factors. Connections between the demagnetizing factor and thin-film growth mechanisms are
also discussed. ©1999 The American Physical Society 

URL: http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRB/v60/p1216 
PACS: 75.70.Ak, 75.30.Pd, 68.35.Ct