Reduction of spike noise in perpendicular recording media by using MnIr antiferromagnetic films

We introduced a NiFe/antiferromagnetic-MnIr bilayer or a NiFe/MnIr/NiFe trilayer below a CoTaZr soft magnetic underlayer in perpendicular recording media as a way of controlling the magnetic domain structure of the soft magnetic underlayer, and we investigated the effect of exchange biasing on the spike noise. Samples consisting of a layer structure-NiFe (5 nm thick)/MnIr (2.5-50 nm)/NiFe (5 nm)/CoTaZr (50-200 nm)-were sputter deposited on precoated glass disks. The samples were heated with a lamp heater and cooled in a magnetic field along the radial direction of the disk. Both uniaxial and unidirectional anisotropies were induced along the magnetic field when the thickness of the MnIr layer was more than 5 nm. The first NiFe layer promoted a fcc-MnIr (111) crystalline texture, while the second NiFe layer enhanced the value of exchange-bias field by about 20%. The exchange-bias field increased from 6 to 24 Oe as the CoTaZr-layer thickness decreased from 200 to 50 nm. Many spikes along the radial direction were observed for a 100-nm-thick CoTaZr single-layer film, while no remarkable spikes were observed for a NiFe/MnIr/NiFe/CoTaZr (100 nm) film. It was found that the NiFe/MnIr/NiFe trilayer restrained the formation of domain walls in the CoTaZr layer, thereby reducing the spike noise. (C) 2002 American Institute of Physics.