Research Progress of Stress-Induced Magnetic Anisotropy in Fe-Based Amorphous and Nanocrystalline Alloys

Since it was discovered that stress annealing induced larger anisotropies compared to other annealing methods in amorphous and nanocrystalline alloys, there has been a lot of research done to explain this phenomenon. This has led to many suggestions about the origin of this stress-induced magnetic anisotropy, but till now the origin is explained with two competing models: the magnetoelastic effect model and the diatomic pair ordering model. In spite of these theories, the origin of the stress-induced anisotropy is still under discussion because direct observation of structural anisotropy is still lacking. In this paper, we have reviewed some of the characterization techniques which have been used to discuss the origin of stress-induced magnetic anisotropy and the progress which has been made thus far in unifying all the contrasting views which has been suggested to be the origin of the stress-induced anisotropy in FINEMET alloys.