Oscillatory thickness dependence of magnetic moments and interface-induced changes of the exchange coupling in Co/Cu and CoNi/Cu multilayers

Abstract We perform first-principles calculations for the three multilayer systems (100)-Co 1 /Cu n , NiCo 2 Ni/Cu n and Co 4 Cu n , and find from a comparison of the results for system 2 and 3 that amplitude and phase of the exchange coupling are sensitive to the magnetic-slab/nonmagnetic-spacer interface. Moreover, we observe that for the system 1 the averaged magnetic moment of the magnetic slab oscillates with the spacer thickness similarly as the exchange coupling.