| Summary: | Thesis (M.Sc.)--Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2009. Physics and Physical Oceanography Includes bibliographical references (leaves 75-80) Patterned magnetic materials are potential candidates for magnetic data storage. Many different techniques have been proposed to fabricate such materials, but the high costs involved have limited their commercial viability. We propose a fast and cheap method of fabricating patterned magnetic materials by electrodepositing through spin coated silica colloidal templates. The structure of the templates prepared by spin coating was analyzed by using scanning electron microscopy, laser diffraction and atomic force microscopy. The structure, thickness, and symmetry present in the templates depends on the spin speed and type of solvent used in making the colloidal suspension for spin coating. We found that the templates are unique orientationally correlated polycrystals, exhibiting short-range positional order and long-range radial orientational correlations [C. Arcos, K. Kumar, W. Gonzalez-Vihas, R. Sirera, K.M. Poduska and A.Yethiraj. Physical Review E, 77:050402/1-4, 2008.]. Based on these templates, a method for preparing patterned cobalt electrodeposits was devised. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) studies showed that electrodeposition produces a cobalt anti-dot array, which conserves the four or six-fold symmetry present in the template. A method for calculating the lateral periodicity and thickness uniformity of the sample by SEM and atomic force microscopy (AFM) was devised.
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