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Influence of inserted Mo layer on the thermal stability of perpendicularly magnetized Ta/Mo/Co20Fe60B20/MgO/Ta films
- Source :
- AIP Advances, Vol 6, Iss 4, Pp 045107-045107-7 (2016)
- Publication Year :
- 2016
- Publisher :
- AIP Publishing LLC, 2016.
-
Abstract
- We studied the thermal stability of perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) in Ta/Mo/CoFeB/MgO/Ta films with and without inserted Mo layers. In the absence of a Mo layer, the films show PMA at annealing temperatures below 300 °C. On the other hand, the insertion of a Mo layer preserves PMA at annealing temperatures of up to 500 °C; however, a higher annealing temperature leads to the collapse of PMA. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) were used to study the microstructure of the films to understand the deterioration of PMA. The XPS results show that the segregation of Ta is partly suppressed by inserting a Mo layer. Once inserted, Mo does not remain at the interface of Ta and CoFeB but migrates to the surface of the films. The HRTEM results show that the crystallization of the MgO (001) texture is improved owing to the higher annealing temperature of the Mo inserted sample. A smooth and clear CoFeB/MgO interface is evident. The inserted Mo layer not only helps to obtain sharper and smoother interfaces but also contributes to the crystallization after the higher annealing temperature of films.
- Subjects :
- 010302 applied physics
Materials science
Annealing (metallurgy)
Tantalum
General Physics and Astronomy
chemistry.chemical_element
02 engineering and technology
021001 nanoscience & nanotechnology
Microstructure
01 natural sciences
lcsh:QC1-999
law.invention
Crystallography
chemistry
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
Transmission electron microscopy
law
0103 physical sciences
Thermal stability
Crystallization
0210 nano-technology
High-resolution transmission electron microscopy
lcsh:Physics
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 21583226
- Volume :
- 6
- Issue :
- 4
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- AIP Advances
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....9d3b891458f1b380eb9eabb3e6c2a2d0