Onset of pattern formation in thin ferromagnetic films with perpendicular anisotropy

Abstract

We consider the onset of pattern formation in an ultrathin ferromagnetic film of the form $\tilde{\Omega}_t := \tilde{\Omega} \times [0,t]$ for $\tilde{ \Omega} \Subset \mathbb{R}^2$ with preferred perpendicular magnetization direction. The relative micromagnetic energy is given by \begin{align} \mathcal{E}[M] &= \int_{\tilde{\Omega}_t} d^2 |\nabla M|^2+ Q \int_{\tilde{\Omega}_t} (M_1^2+M_2^2) + \int_{\mathbb{R}^3} |\mathcal{H}(M)|^2 - \int_{\mathbb{R}^3} |\mathcal{H}(e_3 \chi_{\tilde{ \Omega}})|^2, \end{align} describing the energy difference for a given magnetization $M : \mathbb{R}^3 \to \mathbb{R}^3$ with $|M| = \chi_{\tilde{ \Omega}_t}$ and the uniform magnetization $e_3 \chi_{\tilde{ \Omega}_t}$. For $t \ll d$, we establish the scaling of the energy and a BV-bound in the critical regime here the base area of the film is of order $|\tilde{ \Omega}| \sim (Q-1)^{1/2} d e^{\frac{2\pi d}t \sqrt{Q-1}}$. We furthermore investigate the onset of non-trivial pattern formation in the critical regime depending on the size of the rescaled film.