Interlayer diffusion and specularity aspects of amorphous CoNbZr-based spin valves

Author

Ho Gun Cho ; Young Keun Kim ; Seong-Rae Lee

Author_Institution

Dept. of Mater. Sci. & Eng., Korea Univ., Seoul, South Korea

fYear

2002

Abstract

Summary form only given. Among various factors that affect thermal degradation in spin valves (SV), Mn diffusion into pinned and Cu layers appears to be the most harmful to magnetoresistance (MR) and exchange coupling. The effects of CoNbZr (CNZ) film as underlayer and capping layer on thermal stability and Mn diffusion behavior were investigated at elevated temperatures in CNZ 2 nm (or Ta 5 nm)/CoFe/Cu/CoFe/IrMn/CNZ x nm (or Ta 5 nm) stacks. The normalized MR ratio and H/sub ex/ with respect to annealing time were evaluated.

Keywords

annealing; chemical interdiffusion; cobalt alloys; exchange interactions (electron); magnetoresistance; niobium alloys; spin valves; thermal stability; zirconium alloys; CoNbZr-CoFe-Cu-CoFe-IrMn-CoNbZr; CoNbZr/CoFe/Cu/CoFe/IrMn/CoNbZr; Cu layers; Mn interlayer diffusion; Ta-CoFe-Cu-CoFe-IrMn-Ta; Ta/CoFe/Cu/CoFe/IrMn/Ta; a-CoNbZr-based spin valves; annealing time; capping layer; exchange coupling; magnetoresistance; pinned layers; specularity; thermal degradation; thermal stability; underlayer; Amorphous materials; Annealing; Magnetoresistance; Materials science and technology; Spin valves; Temperature; Thermal degradation; Thermal engineering; Thermal factors; Thermal stability;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Magnetics Conference, 2002. INTERMAG Europe 2002. Digest of Technical Papers. 2002 IEEE International

Conference_Location

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Print_ISBN

0-7803-7365-0

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/INTMAG.2002.1001233

Filename

1001233