Magnetic hysteresis scaling in thulium: Implication of irreversibility-related scaling for soliton wall motion in an Ising system

Abstract We report low-field magnetic hysteresis scaling in thulium with strong uniaxial anisotropy. A power-law hysteresis scaling with an exponent of 1.13 ± 0.02 is found between hysteresis loss and remanent flux density of minor loops in the low-temperature ferrimagnetic phase. This exponent value is slightly lower than 1.25–1.4 observed previously for ferromagnets and helimagnets. Unlike spiral and/or Bloch walls with a finite transition width, typical for Dy, Tb, and Ho with planar anisotropy, a soliton wall with a sudden phase shift between neighboring domains may dominate in Tm due to its Ising-like character. The observations imply the presence of universality class of hysteresis scaling that depends on the type of magnetic anisotropy.