Faraday rotation in ternary ND-CO-FE amorphous films

Ternary amorphous thin film alloys of Nd-Co-Fe show large Faraday rotations (θF) with values up to 7x105 degs/cm at wavelengths of 600 nm. The origin of the rotation is discussed in terms of interband optical transitions and intraband transitions due to the spontaneous Hall effect. A small increase in magnetization is found in the ternary alloys, about 10% greater than the binary Nd-Co and Nd-Fe alloys, which also can account for a small increase of θF. © 1987 IEEE