Headway Technologies, Incorporated

Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

Dan Abels

Min Li

Kunliang Zhang

Chyu-Jiuh Torng

Yu-Hsia Chen

Chen-Jung Chien

Hitoshi Iwasaki

Masayuki Takagishi

Michiko Hara

Masahiro Takashita

Xin Li

A current perpendicular to plane magneto-resistance effect element includes: a magneto-resistance effect film comprised of a fixed magnetization layer, a free magnetization layer, and a complex spacer layer including an insulating layer and current paths formed through the insulating layer; a biasing mechanism for stabilizing the free magnetization layer; a shielding mechanism for ensuring a reproducing resolution of the magneto-resistance effect element; and a pair of electrodes for flowing a current perpendicular to a film surface of the magneto-resistance effect element; wherein a resistance area product (RA:&#x3a9;&#xd7;&#x3bc;m) is set to 0.00062&#xd7;&#x221a;{square root over ((GAP))}&#xd7;TW+0.06 when a track width of the magneto-resistance effect element is defined as TW (nm) and a gap length of the magneto-resistance effect element is defined as GAP (nm).

Current perpendicular to plane magneto-resistance effect element, magnetic head, and magnetic recording/reproducing device

A method of forming a CPP-GMR spin valve having a pinned layer with an AP2/coupling/AP1 configuration is disclosed wherein the AP2 portion is a FCC-like trilayer having a composition represented by CoFe/FeTa/CoFeor CoFe/FeCo/CoFewhere x is 3 to 30 atomic %, y is 40 to 100 atomic %, and z is 75 to 100 atomic %. Preferably, z is 90 to provide a face centered cubic structure that minimizes electromigration. Optionally, the middle layer is comprised of an Fe rich alloy such as FeCr, FeV, FeW, FeZr, FeNb, FeHf, or FeMo. EM performance is improved significantly compared to a spin valve with a conventional AP2 CoFeor CoFesingle layer. MR ratio is also increased and RA is maintained at an acceptable level. The coupling layer is preferably Ru and the AP1 layer may be comprised of a lamination of CoFe and Cu layers as in [CoFe/Cu]/CoFe.

FCC-like trilayer AP2 structure for CPP GMR EM improvement

A CPP-GMR spin valve having a pinned layer with an AP2/coupling/AP1 configuration is disclosed wherein the AP2 portion is a FCC-like trilayer having a composition represented by CoFe/FeTa/CoFeor CoFe/FeCo/CoFewhere x is 3 to 30 atomic %, y is 40 to 100 atomic %, and z is 75 to 100 atomic %. Preferably, z is 90 to provide a face centered cubic structure that minimizes electromigration. Optionally, the middle layer is comprised of an Fe rich alloy such as FeCr, FeV, FeW, FeZr, FeNb, FeHf, or FeMo. EM performance is improved significantly compared to a spin valve with a conventional AP2 CoFeor CoFesingle layer. The MR ratio of the spin valve is also increased and the RA is maintained at an acceptable level. The coupling layer is preferably Ru and the AP1 layer may be comprised of a lamination of CoFe and Cu layers as in [CoFe/Cu]/CoFe.

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San Francisco, CA, United States of America

Dan Abels