The Research Program

The magnetics laboratory is engaged in a variety of basic and applied research problems which range from the fundamental understanding of magnetic order to the study of materials and device structures for memory and high frequency applications. The present emphasis is on microwave and millimeter wave excitations, nonlinear processes, spin wave instability, Brillouin light scattering, and ferrite materials. These research activities are supported by numerous government agencies and industrial sponsors. Present and past sponsors include the National Science Foundation, the U. S. Army Research Office, the Office of Naval Research (USA), the U. S. Air Force (RADC), NASA, NATO, IREX, Rockwell International, Honeywell, Verbatim, TRW, Ampex, Westinghouse, Northrop Grumman, and EDO Ceramics. The group has an international flavor, with research students and visiting scientists from Belarus, Bulgaria, Canada, The Czech Republic, The Peoples Republic of China, Germany, Great Britain, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Russia, Slovakia, Switzerland, and the Ukraine.

The work of the laboratory has been in many areas, including domain wall dynamics in thin films, the effect of chemical short range and long range atomic order on the magnetic state of systems with competing ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic order, spin canting in ferrites with nonmagnetic substitutions, microwave relaxation processes in ferromagnetic thin films, microwave loss mechanisms in ferrites, nonlinear dynamics in magnetic systems, magnetism in spin glasses, Brillouin light scattering on magnetic excitations, giant magnetoresistance in thin film sandwiches, microwave magnetic envelope solitons in thin films, linear and nonlinear precession dynamics, and nanomagnetodynamics. Applied research has been concerned with studies of lunar soil magnetism, microstructure in ferrites, magnetic films for perpendicular recording and high density storage, metallic powders for absorber applications, new materials for millimeter wave applications, microwave soliton thin film devices, and surface damage effects in recording head materials. The systems currently being utilized for these research endeavors include: Broadband Ferromagnetic Resonance (FMR) System , Time and Space Resolved Brillouin Light Scattering (BLS) System , Modified Electron Paramagnetic Resonance System (for FMR) , Effective Linewidth Microwave Spectrometer System , High Power Microwave Spectrometer System , Low Temperature Ferromagnetic Resonance Spectrometer System , Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD) System , Time and Space Resolved Inductive Magnetodynamic Probe (IMP) System , and Vibrating Sample Magnetometer (VSM) System .