Effect of B content on structure and magnetic properties of FeCoB-Al2O3 nanogranular films

The effect of B content on the structure, soft magnetic properties, and high frequency characteristics of as-deposited FeCoB-Al2O3 nanogranular films fabricated by radio frequency magnetron co-sputtering was studied in this work. The introduction of B into the FeCo-Al2O3 films leads to a refinement of granular microstructure. The FeCoB-Al2O3 nanogranular films consist of the FeCoB nanoparticles uniformly embedded in the amorphous Al2O3 matrix. An addition of a small amount of B into the FeCo-Al2O3 films can markedly decrease the coercivity of the films. The excellent magnetic softness with a low coercivity of about 0.08 kA/m was achieved in the FeCoB-Al2O3 films. The Henkel plots confirm the existence of intergranular exchange coupling in the FeCoB-Al2O3 films. The FeCoB-Al2O3 films with low B content exhibit a high permeability over 200 at low frequency and a high-resonance frequency of 3.2 GHz, implying a high cut-off frequency for high frequency applications. (orig.)