Electromigration of magnetic thin films for predicting electrical-failured lifetime of GMR read heads

Author

Seongtae Bae ; I-Fei Tsu ; Davids, Mathias ; Murdock, E.S. ; Judy, J.H.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Minnesota Univ., USA

fYear

2002

Abstract

Summary form only given. Electromigration-induced failures of magnetic thin films have been investigated and analyzed to predict the electrical reliability of giant magnetoresistance (GMR) read heads. Magnetic thin films showed the larger failure lifetime (median time to failure, MTTF) compared to the high conductivity metallic thin films such as Cu and Al thin films under the same constant current biasing conditions. The increase of resistance due to void formation and increase of shunting current or interdiffusion paths due to hillock formation are considered to be serious potential problems in the degradation of the electrical reliability of GMR spin-valve heads.

Keywords

electrical resistivity; electromigration; failure analysis; ferromagnetic materials; giant magnetoresistance; iron alloys; magnetic heads; magnetic thin films; metallic thin films; reliability; spin valves; voids (solid); Al; CoFe; Cu; GMR spin-valve read heads; NiFe; constant current biasing conditions; electrical reliability; electromigration-induced failure; failure lifetime; giant magnetoresistance; hillock formation; interdiffusion paths; magnetic thin films; median time to failure; resistance; shunting current; void formation; Current density; Electromigration; Failure analysis; Giant magnetoresistance; Lifting equipment; Magnetic analysis; Magnetic films; Magnetic heads; Temperature; Transistors;

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.2002.1001075

Filename

1001075