Magnetoelastic surface wave attenuation in ferromagnetic conductors

The effect of conductivity and magnetic damping on magnetoelastic Rayleigh-type surface wave propagation along a tangential saturating field in the [100] direction of a cubic ferromagnetic medium was studied. Potential utilization of highly magnetostrictive rare earth-iron alloys in current surface wave technologies was investigated. Material parameters appropriate to Ga-YIG have been used, and conductivity and magnetic damping were treated as parameters in sample calculations. Two ''loss bands'' of frequency near ferromagnetic resonance are pointed out in which propagation of surface waves is highly attenuating. The attenuation depends strongly on the conductivity and magnetic damping in the lower band, but is otherwise not a strong function of either parameter. To avoid complexities acoustic damping is set equal to zero in the present investigation