Functional 3-D magnetic nanostructures

Abstract

Most of magnetic nano-structures today are ultrathin or nanostructured films and multilayers. The main challenge is to find a suitable technology to integrate and to contact nanostructures in a reliable manner. Here, we investigate the problem of contact integration into functional 3-D devices and evaluate the influence of 3-D magnetic layer geometry on performance of magneto-electronic devices. Real devices are truly 3-dimensional structures. Their topography must absolutely be taken into consideration during the design phase since their inherent non-planarity will profoundly affect their magnetization profile. Our initial results strongly indicate that the “non-flatness” of magnetic layer strongly influences the possible magnetic states, alters the switching mechanism and leads to totally new behavior, which was not observed in classic 2-D thin film magnetic structures.