The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jan. 22, 2008
Filed:
Apr. 20, 2004
Stuart Kao, Fremont, CA (US);
Chunping Luo, Milpitas, CA (US);
Chaopeng Chen, Fremont, CA (US);
Takahiko Machita, Tokyo, JP;
Daisuke Miyauchi, Tokyo, JP;
Jei-wei Chang, Cupertino, CA (US);
Stuart Kao, Fremont, CA (US);
Chunping Luo, Milpitas, CA (US);
Chaopeng Chen, Fremont, CA (US);
Takahiko Machita, Tokyo, JP;
Daisuke Miyauchi, Tokyo, JP;
Jei-Wei Chang, Cupertino, CA (US);
Headway Technologies, Inc., Milpitas, CA (US);
TDK Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
Using a beam of xenon ions together with a suitable mask, a GMR stack is ion milled until a part of it, no more than about 0.1 microns thick, has been removed so that a pedestal, having sidewalls comprising a vertical section that includes all of the free layer, has been formed. This is followed by formation of the longitudinal bias and conductive lead layers in the usual way. Using xenon as the sputtering gas enables the point at which milling is terminated to be more precisely controlled.