Detection and in situ switching of unreversed interfacial antiferromagnetic spins in a perpendicular-exchange-biased system.

By using the perpendicular-exchange-biased Pt/Co/α-Cr(2)O(3) system, we provide experimental evidence that the unreversed uncompensated Cr spins exist at the Co/α-Cr(2)O(3) interface. The unreversed uncompensated Cr spin manifests itself in both the vertical shift of an element-specific magnetization curve and the relative peak intensity of soft-x-ray magnetic circular dichroism spectrum. We also demonstrate an in situ switching of the interfacial Cr spins and correspondingly a reversal of the exchange bias without interfacial atomic diffusion.