Rigid Exchange Coupling in Rare-Earth-Lean Amorphous Hard/Soft Nanocomposites

Electrification of vehicles and renewable energy is increasing the demand for permanent magnets, but the cost and scarcity of rare-earth metals is an obstacle. Creating nanocomposites of rigidly exchange-coupled hard and soft magnets, for which the magnetization reversal occurs as in a single magnetic-phase material, is a promising route toward rare-earth-lean permanent magnets with high energy products. The hard/soft exchange coupling is, however, often reduced due to rough interfaces and structural defects, resulting in exchange-spring behavior rather than rigid exchange coupling. Here, it is shown that artificially sandwiched hard and soft amorphous magnets produced by magnetron sputtering exhibit smooth interfaces, and the first order reversal curve (FORC) technique is used to show that the hard and the soft phases are rigidly exchange coupled. Micromagnetic simulations, using a random-anisotropy model, are used to predict the thickness limit of the rigid exchange coupling. A great advantage of amorphous hard/soft composites is the possibility to obtain a wide range of magnetic properties by finely tuning the composition of the individual phases