Energetics and switching of quasi-uniform states in small ferromagnetic particles

François Alouges, Sergio Conti, Antonio DeSimone, and Yvo Pokern

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Submission date: 27. Oct. 2003
Pages: 18
published in: ESAIM / Mathematical modelling and numerical analysis, 38 (2004) 2, p. 235-248 
DOI number (of the published article): 10.1051/m2an:2004011
Bibtex
MSC-Numbers: 65L60, 82D40, 78M10
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Abstract:
We present a numerical algorithm to solve the micromagnetic equations based on tangential-plane minimization for the magnetization update and a homothethic-layer decomposition of outer space for the computation of the demagnetization field. As a first application, detailed results on the flower-vortex transition in the cube of Micromagnetic Standard Problem number 3 are obtained, which confirm, with a different method, those already present in the literature, and validate our method and code. We then turn to switching of small cubic or almost-cubic particles, in the single-domain limit. Our data show systematic deviations from the Stoner-Wohlfarth model due to the non-ellipsoidal shape of the particle, and in particular a non-monotone dependence on the particle size.