Tunneling magnetoresistance in epitaxial discontinuous Fe/MgO multilayers

Epitaxial discontinuous Fe/MgO multilayers have been grown by pulsed laser deposition on MgO(001) single-crystal substrates. The multilayers with 0.6 nm nominal Fe layers thickness are superparamagnetic and demonstrate tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) in the current-in-plane configuration. Increasi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Applied physics letters 2011-03, Vol.98 (12), p.122502-122502-3
Main Authors: García-García, A., Pardo, J. A., Štrichovanec, P., Magén, C., Vovk, A., De Teresa, J. M., Kakazei, G. N., Pogorelov, Y. G., Morellón, L., Algarabel, P. A., Ibarra, M. R.
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:Epitaxial discontinuous Fe/MgO multilayers have been grown by pulsed laser deposition on MgO(001) single-crystal substrates. The multilayers with 0.6 nm nominal Fe layers thickness are superparamagnetic and demonstrate tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) in the current-in-plane configuration. Increasing deposition temperature causes an improvement in crystal quality and is accompanied by higher TMR ratios. The maximum value (9.2% TMR at room temperature and 18 kOe magnetic field) trebles that of polycrystalline samples deposited simultaneously on glass substrates. A model formula for TMR ratio that includes both spin-dependent tunneling and spin-filtering effect is proposed to explain these results.
ISSN:0003-6951
1077-3118
DOI:10.1063/1.3569149