A Two-Field-Scan Harmonic Hall Voltage Analysis For Fast, Accurate Quantification Of Spin-Orbit Torques In Magnetic Heterostructures

Abstract: The efficiencies of the spin-orbit torques (SOTs) play a key role in the determination of the power consumption, integration density, and endurance of SOT-driven devices. Accurate and time-efficient determination of the SOT efficiencies is of great importance not only for evaluating the practical potential of SOT devices but also for developing new mechanisms for enhancing the SOT efficiencies. Here, we develop a "two-field-scan" harmonic Hall voltage (HHV) analysis that collects the second HHV as a function of a swept in-plane magnetic field at 45{\deg} and 0{\deg} relative to the excitation current. We demonstrate that this two-field-scan analysis is as accurate as the well-established but time-consuming angle-scan HHV analysis even in the presence of considerable thermoelectric effects but takes more than a factor of 7 less measurement time. We also show that the 3-parameter fit of the HHV data from a single field scan at 0{\deg}, which is commonly employed in the literature, is not reliable because the employment of too many free parameters in the fitting of the very slowly varying HHV signal allows unrealistic pseudo-solution and thus erroneous conclusion about the SOT efficiencies.