Abstract
Grazing incidence x-ray scattering (GIXS) and x-ray diffraction (XRD) techniques have been employed to study the microscopic structure of magnetic digital layers of Mn/GaAs and MnGa/GaAs. Samples with various GaAs layer thickness (8 to 16 monolayers) and a half monolayer of either Mn or MnGa were prepared by low-temperature molecular-beam epitaxy. All digital alloys consist of 50 periods of magnetic layers separated by GaAs. High crystalline quality was verified and the periodicity and layer thickness were determined from the GIXS and XRD data. In order to investigate the magnetic properties, we performed magnetization measurements on all samples using superconducting quantum interference device magnetometry (SQUID). © 2002 American Institute of Physics.