Perpendicular magnetic tunnel junctions with double barrier and single or synthetic antiferromagnetic storage layer

Léa Cuchet (1) , Bernard Rodmacq (1) , Stephane Auffret (1) , Ricardo C. Sousa (1) , Ioan L. Prejbeanu (1) , Bernard Dieny (1)

1 SPINTEC - SPINtronique et TEchnologie des Composants

The magnetic properties of double tunnel junctions with perpendicular anisotropy were investigated. Two synthetic antiferromagnetic references are used, while the middle storage magnetic layer can be either a single ferromagnetic or a synthetic antiferromagnetic FeCoB-based layer, with a critical thickness as large as 3.0 nm. Among the different achievable magnetic configurations in zero field, those with either antiparallel references, and single ferromagnetic storage layer, or parallel references, and synthetic antiferromagnetic storage layer, are of particular interest since they allow increasing the efficiency of spin transfer torque writing and the thermal stability of the stored information as compared to single tunnel junctions. The latter configuration can be preferred when stray fields would favour a parallel orientation of the reference layers. In this case, the synthetic antiferromagnetic storage layer is also less sensitive to residual stray fields. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.

Mots clés: Random-Access Memory; Anisotropy

Domaines: Physique [physics]

Léa Cuchet, Bernard Rodmacq, Stephane Auffret, Ricardo C. Sousa, Ioan L. Prejbeanu, et al.. Perpendicular magnetic tunnel junctions with double barrier and single or synthetic antiferromagnetic storage layer. Journal of Applied Physics, 2015, 117 (23), pp.233901. ⟨10.1063/1.4922630⟩. ⟨hal-01589475⟩