Fabrication of anodic aluminium oxide template and the generation of magnetic Co nanowires within it

Among nanostructured materials, magnetic nanowires have been heeded because of their high shape anisotropy and their easy fabrication methods. Electrochemical deposition on the anodic aluminium oxide (AAO) is one of the best methods to grow different nanowires. In this paper, the AAO was fabricated on the 1100 Al alloy substrate by hard anodizing in 0.3 M oxalic acid solution. Then, a barrier layer thinning process was carried out for the electrodeposition process. A pulsed electrodeposition process was used to fill the nano-pores. According to this method, cobalt nanowires were grown in the nano-holes. Structural, crystalline, and magnetic properties of the samples were evaluated using field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM), respectively. The results showed that nanowires have a diameter of 87 nm and crystalline structure with crystalline plates in directions (100), (002), and (110). A coercivity value of 600 Oe was obtained for nanowires, which is several times larger than cobalt bulk.