We
demonstrate an electrochemical deposition process suitable to
form arrays of L10 Fe–Pt nanodots with hard magnetic
properties via electron-beam lithography, template deposition, and
thermal annealing. Synthesis parameters are selected by growing single
and multilayer blanket films and investigating the effect of thermal
annealing on the various films. We find that the fastest ordering
transformation is achieved in eight-layer Fe–Pt multilayers
with a sublayer thickness of 2.5 nm, while a single Fe–Pt layer
or four- and twenty-layer multilayers exhibit a more sluggish ordering
process due to the imperfect layering (twenty-layer) or to the limited
mean free path upon annealing (single- and four-layer); the coercivity
of the eight-layer Fe–Pt multilayer after annealing at 450
°C reached 6.6 kOe, whereas the single Fe–Pt layer showed
only 1.0 kOe. TEM imaging and diffraction show that the L10 Fe–Pt nanodot arrays are single crystal with a (111) orientation,
suggesting a facile L10 ordering when using a multilayer
structure.