Perpendicular Magnetic Anisotropy in Heusler Alloy Films and Their Magnetoresistive Junctions

TY - JOUR

T1 - Perpendicular Magnetic Anisotropy in Heusler Alloy Films and Their Magnetoresistive Junctions

AU - Hirohata, Atsufumi

AU - Frost, William

AU - Samiepour, Marjan

AU - Kim, Jun-Young

N1 - © 2018 by the authors.

PY - 2018/1/11

Y1 - 2018/1/11

N2 - For the sustainable development of spintronic devices, a half-metallic ferromagnetic film needs to be developed as a spin source with exhibiting 100% spin polarisation at its Fermi level at room temperature. One of the most promising candidates for such a film is a Heusler-alloy film, which has already been proven to achieve the half-metallicity in the bulk region of the film. The Heusler alloys have predominantly cubic crystalline structures with small magnetocrystalline anisotropy. In order to use these alloys in perpendicularly magnetised devices, which are advantageous over in-plane devices due to their scalability, lattice distortion is required by introducing atomic substitution and interfacial lattice mismatch. In this review, recent development in perpendicularly-magnetised Heusler-alloy films is overviewed and their magnetoresistive junctions are discussed. Especially, focus is given to binary Heusler alloys by replacing the second element in the ternary Heusler alloys with the third one, e.g., MnGa and MnGe, and to interfacially-induced anisotropy by attaching oxides and metals with different lattice constants to the Heusler alloys. These alloys can improve the performance of spintronic devices with higher recording capacity.

AB - For the sustainable development of spintronic devices, a half-metallic ferromagnetic film needs to be developed as a spin source with exhibiting 100% spin polarisation at its Fermi level at room temperature. One of the most promising candidates for such a film is a Heusler-alloy film, which has already been proven to achieve the half-metallicity in the bulk region of the film. The Heusler alloys have predominantly cubic crystalline structures with small magnetocrystalline anisotropy. In order to use these alloys in perpendicularly magnetised devices, which are advantageous over in-plane devices due to their scalability, lattice distortion is required by introducing atomic substitution and interfacial lattice mismatch. In this review, recent development in perpendicularly-magnetised Heusler-alloy films is overviewed and their magnetoresistive junctions are discussed. Especially, focus is given to binary Heusler alloys by replacing the second element in the ternary Heusler alloys with the third one, e.g., MnGa and MnGe, and to interfacially-induced anisotropy by attaching oxides and metals with different lattice constants to the Heusler alloys. These alloys can improve the performance of spintronic devices with higher recording capacity.

U2 - 10.3390/ma11010105

DO - 10.3390/ma11010105

M3 - Article

SN - 1996-1944

VL - 11

JO - Materials

JF - Materials

IS - 1

M1 - 105

ER -