Chidubem Nwokoye

Magnetocaloric properties of metallic nanostructures

Abstract A compilation of magnetocaloric properties of metallic nanostructures with Curie temperature (TC) between 260 and 340 K has been tabulated. The tabulated data show that nanostructure plays an important role in enhancing the magnetocaloric properties of a material, namely by reducing the peak of magnetic entropy, but broadening of the magnetocaloric effect curve with an average of 10 K sliding window for Curie temperature. A second table lists all bulk metallic and intermetallic materials, in which there is no nanostructural data, with an entropy change of at least 20 J/kg K and a Curie temperature between 260 and 340 K. We propose that further experiments should be made on the nanostructured form of these materials.

A new critical dimension metrology for chrome-on-glass substrates based on s-parameter measurements extracted from coplanar waveguide test structures

The technical objective of the work reported here is to assess whether radio-frequency (RF) measurements made on coplanar waveguide (CPW) test structures, which are replicated in conducting material on insulating substrates, could be employed to extract the critical dimension (CD) of the signal line using its center-to-center separation from the groundlines as a reference. The specific near-term objective is to assess whether this CPW-based CD-metrology has sensitivity and repeatability competitive with the other metrology techniques that are now used for chrome-on-glass (COG) photomasks. An affirmative answer is encouraging because advancing to a non-contact and non-vacuum implementation would then seem possible for this application. Our modeling of specific cases shows that, when the pitch of the replicated lines of the CPW is maintained constant, the sensitivity of its characteristic impedance to the CDs of the signal and ground lines is approximately 60 Ω/μm. This is a potentially useful result. For the same implementation, the quantity ∂C/∂w has a value of approximately 45 (pF/m)/μm, which appears to be large enough to provide acceptable accuracy.

Electric field-controlled magnetization switching in Co/Pt thin-film ferromagnets

Abstract A study of dynamic and reversible voltage-controlled magnetization switching in ferromagnetic Co/Pt thin film with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy at room temperature is presented. The change in the magnetic properties of the system is observed in a relatively thick film of 15 nm. A surface charge is induced by the formation of electrochemical double layer between the metallic thin film and non-aqueous lithium LiClO4 electrolyte to manipulate the magnetism. The change in the magnetic properties occurred by the application of an external electric field. As the negative voltage was increased, the coercivity and the switching magnetic field decreased thus activating magnetization switching. The results are envisaged to lead to faster and ultra-low-power magnetization switching as compared to spin-transfer torque (STT) switching in spintronic devices.