Effect of Interactions and Non-uniform Magnetic States on the Magnetization Reversal of Iron Nanowire Arrays

Ordered ferromagnetic nanowire arrays are widely studied due to the diversity of possible applications. However, there is still no complete understanding of the relation between the array’s parameters and its magnetic behavior. The effect of vortex states on the magnetization reversal of large-diameter nanowires is of particular interest. Here, we compare analytical and micromagnetic models with experimental results for three arrays of iron nanowires with diameters of 33, 52 and 70 nm in order to find the balance between the number of approximations and resources used for the calculations. The influence of the vortex states and the effect of interwire interactions on the remagnetization curves are discussed. It has been found that 7 nanowires treated by a mean field model are able to reproduce well the reversal behavior of the whole array in the case of large diameter nanowires. Vortex states tend to decrease the influence of the structural inhomogeneities on reversal process and thus lead to the increased predictability of the system.