On-Chip Planar Metasurfaces for Magnetic Sensors with Greatly Enhanced Sensitivity

Metamaterials with engineered structures have been extensively investigated for their capability to manipulate optical, acoustic, or thermal waves. In particular, magnetic metamaterials with precise geometry, shape, size and arrangement of their elemental blocks may be used to concentrate, focus, or guide magnetic fields. In this work, we show the potential of using soft-magnetic permalloy (Py) metasurfaces to tailor the physical properties of other magnetic structures at the local scale. As an illustration, the magnetic response of a Cobalt (Co) sensor bar placed at the core of a Py metasurface is investigated as a function of in-plane magnetic fields through the planar Hall effect. Our findings reveal that by appropriately selecting the metasurface geometrical parameters, we can adjust the Co bar’s coercive field and susceptibility, leading to a huge enhancement in sensor sensitivity of over 2 orders of magnitude. Micromagnetic simulations, coupled with magneto-transport equations and X-ray photoemission electron measurements (XPEEM) with contrast from magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD), accurately capture this effect and provide insights into the underlying physical mechanisms. These findings can potentially enhance the performance and versatility of magnetic functional devices by using specifically designed structural magnetic materials.