  Magnetic anisotropies of ferromagnetic thin films are induced by epitaxial
strain from the substrate via strain-induced anisotropy in the orbital magnetic
moment and that in the spatial distribution of spin-polarized electrons.
However, the preferential orbital occupation in ferromagnetic metallic
La$_{1-x}$Sr$_x$MnO$_3$ (LSMO) thin films studied by x-ray linear dichroism
(XLD) has always been found out-of-plane for both tensile and compressive
epitaxial strain and hence irrespective of the magnetic anisotropy. In order to
resolve this mystery, we directly probed the preferential orbital occupation of
spin-polarized electrons in LSMO thin films under strain by angle-dependent
x-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD). Anisotropy of the spin-density
distribution was found to be in-plane for the tensile strain and out-of-plane
for the compressive strain, consistent with the observed magnetic anisotropy.
The ubiquitous out-of-plane preferential orbital occupation seen by XLD is
attributed to the occupation of both spin-up and spin-down out-of-plane
orbitals in the surface magnetic dead layer.
