Hysteresis and interaction between the magnetic layers in spin valves

Author

Nioshioka, K. ; Gangopadhyay, Sunita ; Fujiwara, Hideo ; Parker, Martin

Author_Institution

Data Storage & Retrival Sys. Div., Hitachi Ltd., Odawara, Japan

Volume

31

Issue

6

fYear

1995

fDate

11/1/1995 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

3949

Lastpage

3951

Abstract

Spin valve characteristics have been investigated in the samples of glass /Ta(X Å)/NiFe(Y_f Å)/Cu(Z Å)/NiFe(Y _p Å)/FeMn(150 Å)/Ta(50 Å) with various X, Y _f, Y_p and Z values. The pinning field of FeMn increases and saturates X, Y_f and Y_p, followed by an improvement of (111) texturing of the NiFe/Cu/NiFe/FeMn layers. GMR vs. field curves in the easy magnetization direction were studied for various Cu thicknesses, Z. With decreasing Z, the coercivity of the free layer begins to decrease, followed by a reduction of the GMR effect which finally disappears. This change can be explained semi-quantitatively by theoretical analysis which assumes some dispersion in the direction of the pinning field

Keywords

coercive force; copper; giant magnetoresistance; iron alloys; magnetic hysteresis; magnetic multilayers; magnetoresistance; manganese alloys; metallic superlattices; nickel alloys; tantalum; texture; (111) texturing; Cu thicknesses; Ta-NiFe-Cu-NiFe-FeMn-Ta; Ta-NiFe-Cu-NiFe-FeMn-Ta structure; coercivity; easy magnetization direction; giant magnetoresistance; hysteresis; magnetic layers; pinning field; spin valves; Antiferromagnetic materials; Magnetic analysis; Magnetic films; Magnetic heads; Magnetic hysteresis; Magnetic materials; Memory; Saturation magnetization; Spin valves; Sputtering;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Magnetics, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9464

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/20.489826

Filename

489826