Quadratic and third-order magneto-optic Kerr effect in Ni(111) thin films with and without twinning

The longitudinal magneto-optic Kerr effect (LMOKE) as well as the quadratic MOKE (QMOKE) are important magneto-optic effects of fundamental physics but also powerful tools for thin-film sample characterization, e.g., to analyze magnetocrystalline anisotropies via vectorial magnetometry [1], to quantitatively determine the magnetooptic parameters of higher order in M [2] or to sense the crystallographic ordering in Heusler compounds [3]. We investigated sputter-deposited Ni(111) thin films and report on a strong three-fold angular dependence for LMOKE and QMOKE which cannot be explained by contributions of first and second order in M. Instead, third-order MOKE is needed to describe the observed angular dependencies [4]. We further studied Ni(111) thin films with and without two (111) phases (twinning). We observed substantial reduction of all MOKE contributions in a twinned sample compared to a non-twinned sample. This indicates that the MOKE angular dependencies truly are of crystallographic origin and not due to other, e.g., interface effects.

[1] T. Kuschel et al., J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 44, 265003 (2011)

[2] R. Silber et al., Phys. Rev. B 100, 064403 (2019)

[3] R. Silber et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 116, 262401 (2020)

[4] A. V. Petukhov et al., J. Appl. Phys. 83, 6742 (1998)