Effects of substrate temperature and annealing on the anisotropic magnetoresistive property of NiFe films

摘要

Ni83Fe17 films with a thickness of about 100 nm were deposited on thermal oxidized silicon substrates at ambient temperature, 240, 350, and 410℃ by DC magnetron sputtering. The deposition rate was about 0.11 nm/s. The as-deposited films were annealed at 450, 550, and 650℃, respectively, in a vacuum lower than 3 x 10-3 Pa for 1 h. The Ni83Fe17 films mainly grow with a crystalline orientation of [111] in the direction of the film growth. With the annealing temperature increasing, the [ 111] orientation enhances. For films deposited at all four different temperatures, the significant improvement on anisotropic magnetoresistance occurs at the annealing temperature higher than 550℃. But for films deposited at ambient temperatures and 240℃, the anisotropic magnetoresistance can only rise to about 1% after 650℃ annealing. For films deposited at 350℃ and 410℃, the anisotropic magnetoresistance rises to about 3.8% after 650℃ annealing. The atomic force microscopy (AFM) observation shows a significant increase in grain size of the film deposited at 350℃ atter 650℃annealing. The decrease in resistivity and the increase in anisotropic magnetoresistance are caused by the decrease in point defects, the increase in grain size, and the improvement in lattice structure integrity of the films.