Electrodeposition of Periodically Nanostructured Straight Cobalt Filament Arrays

Arrays of straight cobalt filaments with periodic corrugation on the surface are electrodeposited on a glass substrate without using templates. The corrugated structures on the filaments are induced by the spontaneous oscillation of electric voltage in electrodeposition, and the periodicity can be tuned by applying different electric currents. Magnetic force microscopy indicates that when the interfilament separation is large, the magnetic domains are regularly aligned on the filament. Each corrugated structure on the filament surface corresponds to a local single magnetic domain. The domains become random when the interfilament separation becomes very small. We suggest that our results could be helpful in understanding the formation of magnetic domain patterns on a microscopic scale and may have potential application in spintronics.