Seagate Technology Incorporated

Mohammed Sharia Ullah Patwari

Victor Sapozhnikov

Dimitar Velikov Dimitrov

Eric Walter Singleton

Shaun Eric McKinlay

Harry Sam Edelman

Jae-Young Yi

Konstantin Nikolaev

Liwen Tan

Dion Song

Taras Grigoryevich Pokhil

Victor Boris Sapozhnikov

An apparatus disclosed herein includes a sensor with a free layer having cross-track easy axis anisotropy.

Reader structure

Implementations disclosed herein include a reader comprising a magnetically free layer and first barrier layer, wherein the barrier layer is in direct contact with a bottom shield in a down-track direction. Another implementation includes a device comprising a sensor stack comprising a free layer and a barrier layer; a synthetic antiferromagnetic shield layer comprising a reference layer and a pinned layer, wherein direction of magnetization of the reference layer forms an obtuse angle with direction of magnetization of the free layer in a quiescent state.

Reader structure with barrier layer contacting shield

Implementations described and claimed herein provide a stacked dual reader with a bottom sensor stack and a top sensor stack separated by a top mid-shield and a bottom mid-shield, and a pre-amplifier circuit comprising a top lead connected to the top mid-shield, configured to collect current flowing from the top mid-shield through the top sensor stack opposite a direction of current flowing from the bottom mid-shield to a bottom lead through the bottom sensor stack.

Dual reader structure

A sensor structure that has a sensor stack comprising a recessed AFM layer, a combined pinned layer/reference layer (PL/RL) directly on the AFM layer, a free layer (FL), and a barrier layer between the PL/RL and the FL. All the magnetic layers between the AFM layer and the FL have substantially the same magnetic orientation. The sensor structure includes a top shield and a front bottom shield adjacent to the recessed AFM layer.

Reader sensor structure having front bottom shield adjacent recessed AFM layer

An apparatus disclosed herein includes a sensor stack including a first layer and an AFM stabilized bottom shield in proximity to the first layer, wherein the AFM stabilized bottom shield is magnetically coupled to the first layer. The apparatus reduces shield-to-shield spacing. The pinned layer of the bottom shield and a pinned layer of the sensor stack are stabilized using the AFM layer in the bottom shield. In one implementation, the bottom shield is made of the SAF structure, with the top layer of the structure adjacent to a pinned layer in the sensor stack.

Magnetoresistive sensor with AFM-stabilized bottom shield

Implementations described and claimed herein provide a stacked dual reader with a bottom sensor stack and a top sensor stack wherein the bottom sensor stack and the top sensor stack are mirrored along a down-track direction.

Implementations described and claimed herein provide a dual reader wherein a bottom shield is attached to side shields.

An apparatus disclosed herein comprises a magnetically free layer and a bottom shield, wherein a first portion of the bottom shield substantially adjacent the free layer is pinned perpendicular to an air-bearing surface (ABS) of the apparatus and a second portion of the bottom shield not substantially adjacent the free layer is pinned parallel to the ABS of the apparatus.

Magnetoresistive sensor

Implementations disclosed herein allow a signal detected by a magnetoresistive (MR) sensor to be improved by providing for one or more regions of reduced anisotropy proximal to a sensor stack within a shielding structure.

Growing community of inventors

Eden Prairie, MN, United States of America

Mohammed Sharia Ullah Patwari