Collinear and noncollinear ferrimagnetic phases in Mn4N investigated by magneto-optical Kerr spectroscopy

Ferrimagnetic antiperovskite Mn4N has received growing interest due to room-temperature observation of large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy, low saturation magnetization, and ultrafast response to external magnetic fields. Comprehensive understanding of the underlying magnetic structure is instrumental in design and fabrication of computer memory and logic devices. Magneto-optical spectroscopy provides deeper insight into the magnetic and electronic structure than magnetometry. Simulations of a magneto-optical Kerr effect in biaxially strained Mn4N are performed using density functional theory and linear response theory. We consider three ferrimagnetic phases, two collinear and one noncollinear, which have been investigated separately by earlier studies. The simulated spectra are compared to measured magneto-optical data available in recent literature. One of the collinear ferrimagnetic phases is found to be consistent with the measured spectra. We show that an admixture of the noncollinear phase, which is the ground state of unstrained Mn4N, further improves the agreement with measured spectra, and at the same time, it could explain the lower than predicted net moment and magnetic anisotropy observed in thin films on various substrates.