DocumentCode
858549
Title
Transmission Electron Microscopy Study of the Fe(001) 
MgO(001) Interface for Magnetic Tunnel Junctions
Author
Wang, Chao ; Wang, Shouguo ; Kohn, Amit ; Ward, Roger C C ; Petford-Long, Amanda K.
Author_Institution
Dept. of Mater., Oxford Univ.
Volume
43
Issue
6
fYear
2007
fDate
6/1/2007 12:00:00 AM
Firstpage
2779
Lastpage
2781
Abstract
Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) is employed to characterize ex situ the interface between the bottom Fe (001) electrode and MgO (001) barrier in a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) deposited by molecular beam epitaxy. High resolution TEM images are compared with multislice-based simulations of oxidized and sharp interfaces to conclude that at least the part of the interface is not oxidized. In addition, the spacing between the Fe and O layers at the interface is measured and found to be comparable with theoretical calculations in the literature of sharp interfaces. This result offers a methodology to characterize the interface structure of MTJs, which is important to determine the magneto-transport properties of the device
Keywords
ferromagnetic materials; galvanomagnetic effects; interface magnetism; interface structure; iron; magnesium compounds; magnetic tunnelling; molecular beam epitaxial growth; transmission electron microscopy; Fe-MgO; high resolution TEM; interface structure; magnetic tunnel junctions; magneto-transport properties; molecular beam epitaxy; Electrodes; Electron beams; Image resolution; Iron; Magnetic devices; Magnetic force microscopy; Magnetic properties; Magnetic tunneling; Molecular beam epitaxial growth; Transmission electron microscopy; Electron microscopy; epitaxial growth; interface phenomena; oxidation; tunnel junction;
fLanguage
English
Journal_Title
Magnetics, IEEE Transactions on
Publisher
ieee
ISSN
0018-9464
Type
jour
DOI
10.1109/TMAG.2007.893694
Filename
4202692
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