Giant magneto-optical Kerr effect enhancement in layered CoMn/Si structures.

For sputtered Co[sub 57]Mn[sub 43]/Si film samples with different ferromagnetic thickness, the spectra of the complex magneto-optical polar Kerr rotation and optical constants were ex-situ measured. For 5 nm-thick Co[sub 57]Mn[sub 43] film, the Kerr rotation around 4.3 eV was enhanced by a factor of about 10 times with lower loss of the signal intensity as compared to the thick film. Numerical calculations show that the enhancement effect is attributed to an interplay between optical properties of Co[sub 57]Mn[sub 43] and substrate Si that has a strong interband transition (E[sub 2]) near 4.3 eV. © 2000 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]