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Ultrathin Carbon-Based Overcoats for Extremely High Density Magnetic Recording

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Abstract

Reduction of the magnetic spacing in magnetic hard disk drives (HDDs) and tape drives is crucial to maintain proper recording and readback at extremely high areal densities. In HDDs, the media overcoat contributes to a significant part of the magnetic spacing, whereas in tape drives, abrasive wear of the head sensors leads to higher spacing. This necessitates the use of ultrathin overcoats which can maintain corrosion and tribological protection at the head-media interface, and ideally possess good thermal stability for heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR). In this thesis, such challenges are addressed through the development of novel carbon-based overcoats with thicknesses of ≤ 2 nm for HDD media and ≤ 20 nm for tape drive heads, using novel processes. The suitability of graphene as an overcoat for HDD media is also explored. The improved functional properties of these overcoats are subsequently explained in terms of their microstructure and interfacial bonding.

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  1. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Reuben Jueyuan Yeo

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Yeo, R.J. (2017). Introduction. In: Ultrathin Carbon-Based Overcoats for Extremely High Density Magnetic Recording. Springer Theses. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-4882-1_1

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