Imaging Nanoscale Magnetic Structures With Polarized Soft X-Ray Photons

Imaging nanoscale magnetic structures and their fast dynamics is scientifically interesting and technologically of highest relevance. The combination of circularly polarized soft X-ray photons, which provide a strong X-ray magnetic circular dichroism effect at characteristic X-ray absorption edges, with a high-resolution soft X-ray microscope utilizing Fresnel zone plate optics allows, in a unique way, the study of the stochastical behavior in the magnetization reversal process of thin films and the ultrafast dynamics of magnetic vortices and domain walls in confined ferromagnetic structures. Future sources of femtosecond-short and highly intense soft X-ray photon pulses hold the promise of magnetic imaging down to fundamental magnetic length and time scales.