Thermally assisted recording beyond traditional limits

Abstract

An approach to overcome the current magnetic storage density limitations due to superparamagnetic effects by thermally assisted writing was described. An optical pulse from a laser diode focused onto the back of the cantilever heats the lever and the tip. It was observed that the smaller bits were accomplished by a decrease in the grain size of the recording medium while the number of grains within one bit cell is kept constant. It was shown that the recording densities of 1 Tbit/in. 2 accompanied by thermal diffusion speeds larger than 1 GHz could be accomplished using thermally assisted writing.