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Effects of Sputtering Angle on Surface Roughness, Chemical Composition and Giant Magnetoresistance Properties of NiO and α-Fe2O3 Bottom Spin-Valves

Published

Author(s)

S Bae, P J. Chen, William F. Egelhoff Jr., J H. Judy

Abstract

The effects of sputtering angle on surface roughness chemical composition, and giant magnetoresistance (GMR) properties of bottom spin-valves have been investigated by RF sputtering of anti-ferromagnetic (AF) films of NiO and α-Fe2O3 on Si substrates at off -axis positions from target center and then DC sputtering of Co/Cu/Co multilayers . The surface roughness decreased dramatically from Ra = 0.76 nm at target center position and the corresponding GMR ration increased from 13.5% to 19.8% for NiO and from 9.8% and 13% for α-fe2O3. According to XTEM, AFM, and XPS analyses, these large improvements of gMR properties were found to correlate with the decrease in surface roughness, the increase in crystal orientation texture, and the nearly bulk stoichiometry of the AF NiO and α-Fe2O3nfilms.
Citation
IEEE Transactions on Magnetics

Keywords

giant magnetoresistance (GMR), iron oxide, nichel oxide

Citation

Bae, S. , Chen, P. , Egelhoff Jr., W. and Judy, J. (2021), Effects of Sputtering Angle on Surface Roughness, Chemical Composition and Giant Magnetoresistance Properties of NiO and &#945;-Fe<sub>2</sub>O<sub>3</sub> Bottom Spin-Valves, IEEE Transactions on Magnetics (Accessed March 29, 2024)
Created October 12, 2021