Magnetic volcanos in gadolinium Langmuir-Blodgett films

Magnetic, structural and electronic properties of Langmuir–Blodgett films with incorporated Gd3+ ions has been detected using a scanning DC SQUID microscope, scanning electron microscope and X-ray diffraction. The magnetic images of 28 and 50 layer thick films at 77 K have been obtained after in-plane and out-of-plane pre-magnetization in a field of 1.4 T at 300 K. Randomly placed “magnetic volcanos” with a remanent magnetic moment of the order of 10−13 A m2 was observed. A decay of the remanent magnetization with a characteristic time of about 120 h was observed. It is suggested that the magnetic order is relatively long ranged, and that topological defects (vortices) lead to the observed out-of-plane field lines, and are responsible for the magnetic volcanos. Finally, it is hypothesized that a similar topology of field lines is responsible for superconductivity as observed in ceramic high-TC superconductors.