Abstract
The magnetic properties of 1μ;m wide Co zigzag wires are studied by the in-situ combination of magnetic force microscopy (MFM) and magnetoresistance (MR) measurements. The main advantage of our room temperature experiments is the possibility to directly link changes in the magnetization to changes in the magnetoresistance. In order to support the interpretation of our experimental results, the magnetic states of the zigzag wires are obtained from detailed micromagnetic simulations. The magnetic properties of the zigzag wires are dominated by the shape anisotropy due to the reduced width, while the observed magnetoresistance is largely determined by the anisotropic magnetoresistance (AMR) effect.
