Magnetic bubble device scaling and density limits

Scaling of magnetic bubble devices to smaller bubble sizes and higher density is considered. Drive field requirements, materials requirements, fabrication requirements, current requirements, and detector signal-to-noise ratio are all calculated as a function of bubble size and related to practical limits imposed by bubble materials, fabrication techniques, and electromigration limits. It is concluded that "conventional" bubble devices using Permalloy bars can be made practical with 1-μm bubble domains (storage density bits/cm²). Although it may be possible to extend these Permalloy bar devices to even smaller bubbles, it seems more likely that other bubble devices such as contiguous disk devices or bubble lattice devices will in fact be used for densities greater than 6 × 10⁶bits/cm².