We show experimentally and by model calculations that in finite, nonellipsoidal, micrometer size magnetic thin film elements the dynamic magnetic eigenexcitations (spin waves) may exhibit strong spatial localization. This localization is due to the formation of a potential well for spin waves in the highly inhomogeneous internal magnetic field within the element.

Abstract:We present spectral measurements of spin-wave excitations driven by direct spin-

A Brillouin light scattering study and theoretical interpretation of spin-wave modes in arrays of in-plane magnetized micron-size rectangular Ni 80 Fe 20 elements are reported. It is shown that two-dimensional spinwave eigenmodes of these elements can be approximately described as products of one-dimensional spin-wave eigenmodes of longitudinally and transversely magnetized long finite-width permalloy stripes. The lowest eigenmodes of rectangular elements are of dipole-exchange nature and are localized near the element edges, while the higher eigenmodes are of a mostly dipolar nature and are weakly localized near the element center. The frequency spectra and spatial profiles of these eigenmodes are calculated both analytically and numerically, and are compared with the results of the Brillouin light scattering experiment.

In this paper a detailed numerical study (in frames of the Slonczewski formalism) of magnetization oscillations driven by a spin-polarized current through a thin elliptical nanoelement is presented. We show that a sophisticated micromagnetic model, where a polycrystalline structure of a nanoelement is taken into account, can explain qualitatively all most important features of the magnetization oscillation spectra recently observed experimentally (S.I. Kiselev et al., Nature, 425, 380 (2003)), namely: existence of several equidistant spectral bands, sharp onset and abrupt disappearance of magnetization oscillations with increasing current, absence of the out-of-plane regime predicted by a macrospin model and the relation between frequencies of so called small-angle and quasichaotic oscillations. However, a quantitative agreement with experimental results (especially concerning the frequency of quasichaotic oscillations) could not be achieved in the region of reasonable parameter values, indicating that further model refinement is necessary for a complete understanding of the spin-driven magnetization precession even in this relatively simple experimental situation.

This paper is devoted to numerical simulations of the magnetization dynamics driven by a spinpolarized current in extended ferromagnetic multilayers when a point-contact setup is used. We present (i) detailed analysis of methodological problems arising by such simulations and (ii) physical results obtained on a system similar to that studied in Rippard et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 92, 027201 (2004). We demonstrate that the usage of a standard Slonczewski formalism for the phenomenological treatment of a spin-induced torque leads to a qualitative disagreement between simulation results and experimental observations and discuss possible reasons for this discrepancy.