1. Field
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to data storage systems, and more particularly, to fabrication of heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) heads.
2. Description of the Related Art
Higher storage bit densities in magnetic media used in disk drives have reduced the size (volume) of magnetic bits to the point where the magnetic bit dimensions are limited by the grain size of the magnetic material. Although grain size can be reduced further, the data stored within the cells may not be thermally stable. That is, random thermal fluctuations at ambient temperatures may be sufficient to erase data. This state is described as the superparamagnetic limit, which determines the maximum theoretical storage density for a given magnetic media. This limit may be raised by increasing the coercivity of the magnetic media or by lowering the temperature. Lowering the temperature may not always be practical when designing hard disk drives for commercial and consumer use. Raising the coercivity, on the other hand, requires write heads that incorporate higher magnetic moment materials, or techniques such as perpendicular recording (or both).
One additional solution has been proposed, which uses heat to lower the effective coercivity of a localized region on the magnetic media surface and writes data within this heated region. The data state becomes “fixed” once the media cools to ambient temperatures. This technique is broadly referred to as “thermally assisted (magnetic) recording” (TAR or TAMR), “energy assisted magnetic recording” (EAMR), or “heat-assisted magnetic recording” (HAMR) which are used interchangeably herein. It can be applied to longitudinal and perpendicular recording systems as well as “bit patterned media”. Heating of the media surface has been accomplished by a number of techniques such as focused laser beams or near-field optical sources.
Fabrication of HAMR heads involves a series of fabrication steps inserted into the standard magnetic-recording head-build process flow to define two optical components: a microphotonic spot-size converter (SSC) and a near-field transducer (NFT). SSC converts a highly-divergent output of an external semiconductor laser diode into a well-confined mode that couples into the NFT. The NFT is a plasmonic nano-antenna that further focuses the light into an ultra-small spot-size for high-density magnetic recording. Due to the complexity of the fabrication process and a lack of reliable optical metrology, it remains challenging to evaluate the effect of individual fabrication steps on the efficiency of the HAMR optical delivery system and to optimize the steps accordingly to improve performance. Therefore, there is a need in the art for an improved optical metrology component for HAMR heads.
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to an optical metrology system and methods of using the optical metrology system. The optical metrology system has a linear optical array including a plurality of optical components. One end of the linear optical array is configured to receive a confined beam. At various stages of the fabrication process, the performance of the actual optical components used in HAMR devices is evaluated based on the performance of the optical metrology system.
In one embodiment, a method for evaluating performance of optical components of a heat assisted magnetic recording device is disclosed. The method includes depositing an optical metrology system on a wafer. The optical metrology system includes a grating and a linear optical array of SSCs. The linear optical array has a bottom cladding, a waveguide disposed over the bottom cladding, and a top cladding disposed over the bottom cladding and the waveguide. The method further includes coupling a probing light using the grating into the linear optical array, measuring an optical output from the linear optical array and determining an optical loss parameter.
In another embodiment, an optical metrology system is disclosed. The optical metrology system includes a first grating disposed at a first end of the optical metrology system and a linear optical array. The linear optical array includes a bottom cladding, a waveguide disposed over the bottom cladding and a top cladding disposed over the bottom cladding and the waveguide.
So that the manner in which the above recited features of the present invention can be understood in detail, a more particular description of the invention, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to embodiments, some of which are illustrated in the appended drawings. It is to be noted, however, that the appended drawings illustrate only typical embodiments of this invention and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the invention may admit to other equally effective embodiments.
To facilitate understanding, identical reference numerals have been used, where possible, to designate identical elements that are common to the figures. It is contemplated that elements disclosed in one embodiment may be beneficially utilized on other embodiments without specific recitation.
In the following, reference is made to embodiments of the invention. However, it should be understood that the invention is not limited to specific described embodiments. Instead, any combination of the following features and elements, whether related to different embodiments or not, is contemplated to implement and practice the invention. Furthermore, although embodiments of the invention may achieve advantages over other possible solutions and/or over the prior art, whether or not a particular advantage is achieved by a given embodiment is not limiting of the invention. Thus, the following aspects, features, embodiments and advantages are merely illustrative and are not considered elements or limitations of the appended claims except where explicitly recited in a claim(s). Likewise, reference to “the invention” shall not be construed as a generalization of any inventive subject matter disclosed herein and shall not be considered to be an element or limitation of the appended claims except where explicitly recited in a claim(s).
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to an optical metrology system and methods of using the optical metrology system. The optical metrology system has a linear optical array including a plurality of optical components. One end of the linear optical array is configured to receive a confined beam. At various stages of the fabrication process, the performance of the actual optical components used in HAMR devices is evaluated based on the performance of the optical metrology system.
At least one slider 113 is positioned near the magnetic disk 112, each slider 113 supporting one or more magnetic head assemblies 121 that may include a radiation source (e.g., a laser or electrically resistive heater) for heating the disk surface 122. As the magnetic disk rotates, the slider 113 moves radially in and out over the disk surface 122 so that the magnetic head assembly 121 may access different tracks of the magnetic disk 112 where desired data are written. Each slider 113 is attached to an actuator arm 119 by way of a suspension 115. The suspension 115 provides a slight spring force which biases the slider 113 against the disk surface 122. Each actuator arm 119 is attached to an actuator means 127. The actuator means 127 as shown in
During operation of a TAR or HAMR enabled disk drive 100, the rotation of the magnetic disk 112 generates an air bearing between the slider 113 and the disk surface 122 which exerts an upward force or lift on the slider 113. The air bearing thus counter-balances the slight spring force of suspension 115 and supports slider 113 off and slightly above the disk 112 surface by a small, substantially constant spacing during normal operation. The radiation source heats up the high-coercivity media so that the write elements of the magnetic head assemblies 121 may correctly magnetize the data bits in the media.
The various components of the disk drive 100 are controlled in operation by control signals generated by control unit 129, such as access control signals and internal clock signals. Typically, the control unit 129 comprises logic control circuits, storage means and a microprocessor. The control unit 129 generates control signals to control various system operations such as drive motor control signals on line 123 and head position and seek control signals on line 128. The control signals on line 128 provide the desired current profiles to optimally move and position slider 113 to the desired data track on disk 112. Write and read signals are communicated to and from write and read heads on the assembly 121 by way of recording channel 125.
The above description of a typical magnetic disk storage system and the accompanying illustration of
A plurality of SSCs 130 is formed on a plurality of sliders 113 that are formed on a wafer. Each slider 113 is then separated from the wafer, and then the performance of the SSC 130 disposed on the slider 113 is tested. It would be beneficial to be able to test the performance of the SSCs 130 when they are still disposed on the wafer, i.e., on the wafer level.
Traditional optical metrology tools for characterization of miniaturized optical components such as SSCs used in HAMR perform the analysis by measuring the intensity of light coupled into the device (Iin) and the light emitted from the device (Iout) to determine the optical loss coefficient (α). The conventional definition of decibel based on base-10 logarithm is chosen to express the magnitude of the loss coefficient in dBs, i.e. α[dB]=10*log10(Iout/Iin). The optical loss coefficient includes the intrinsic loss parameter (αint) related to the device design and material parameters and the extrinsic loss parameter (αext) resulting from fabrication-induced imperfection such as surface roughness and dimensional variations. The αint can be determined with electromagnetic modeling tools. The extrinsic losses need to be minimized and monitored during the fabrication process because the extrinsic losses degrade the HAMR device performance beyond what is predicted by simulations. The relationship between the measured optical intensities and the relevant loss parameters is given by: Iout=Iin*10(αin+αout+αint+αext)/10, where αin and αout are the in and out coupling loss parameters, respectively. The αext should be kept within a specified range in order to guide process optimization aimed at reducing the magnitude and the variance across wafer of the extrinsic loss. The magnitude of αext can be quite difficult to extract from measurements of: Iin and Iout because of the uncertainty in magnitude of the coupling loss parameters αin and αout. Coupling loss with a large variance would inevitably obscure the measurement of αext.
In addition, the problem of evaluating αext on an intact wafer is considerably more difficult because such characterization requires high-precision fabrication of miniaturized optical components (typically waveguide gratings, V-grooves, wedge (prism) couplers, or evanescent couplers) for efficient coupling of light into the wafer plane. Fabricating high-quality optical couplers with small variances in αin and αout is just as challenging as making an efficient SSC. The magnitude of αin depends on the profile of the probing beam incident upon the SSC input which is difficult to control on wafer level. Reliable measurements of αext to characterize SSC performance is not possible if the efficiencies of the coupling components vary considerably across the wafer.
For a single SSC 130, the conversion of the highly divergent beam into a confined beam performed by the SSC 130 has some characteristic loss α, where α=αint+αext. The associated decrease in optical intensity (total intensity integrated over the whole spot-size) due to the transformation from the highly divergent beam to the confined beam is proportional to 10α/10. In particular, Iout=Iin*10α/10. The same SSC 130 operated in reverse direction will convert a confined beam into a highly divergent beam with the same efficiency, i.e., Iout=Iin*10β/10, where β is the characteristic loss of conversion of the confined beam into the highly divergent beam. Since the Maxwell equations are time-reversible and there are no photons created and lost during the conversion process, α=β.
As shown in
The intensity of light propagated through the linear optical array 300 having N SSCs 130 is given by: IN=IN=0*10Nα/10, and the intensity is exponentially decreasing at a rate described by characteristic optical-propagation constant a (optical loss coefficient), which can be extracted by plotting log10(IN) vs. N and obtaining a linear regression fit through the data points. The method of measuring IN is described in
Next, at stage (1), as shown in
Next, at stage (2), as shown in
Finally, at stage (3), as shown in
The gratings 702 may have a grating period “Λ” that can be obtained by solving the grating equation: neff=nt sin θ+m*(λ/Λ), where neff is the effective index of the guided mode at the particular fabrication stage, nt is the refractive index of the top cladding 608, m is the diffraction order, λ is the free space wavelength of the coupled light, Λ is the grating period and θ is the angle of incidence. The magnitudes of all the relevant parameters should be as large as possible to facilitate fabrication, but not as large as to allow multiple solutions of the grating equation because this would result in coupling into higher diffraction orders, thereby reducing the coupling efficiency.
In one embodiment, an optical metrology system 700 has nb of 1.5, nc of 2.0, and nt of 1.0. As determined by FDTD simulations, the effective refractive index neff of the transverse electric (TE) fundamental guided mode in this structure at λ=633 nm is 1.866. The solutions to the grating equation are plotted in
There is a significant modal mismatch between a typical free-space laser beam (a highly collimated with a beam diameter of about 1 mm) or the optical fiber output used as a probing light source and the fundamental guided mode in the waveguide with sub-micron modal diameter. To alleviate this problem, parallel waveguide arrays (cores) can be patterned at stage (2) instead of a single array of cores. This arrangement not only utilizes the probing beam more efficiently, but also provides a natural way of obtaining the average loss per waveguide by probing multiple waveguides simultaneously with a single measurement. The waveguides should be placed sufficiently far apart so that the evanescent waves of the guided modes do not overlap to create coupled-modes. If the waveguides are too close to each other, the effective refractive index of the guided mode will be different and the characteristic loss of the array will not represent the loss of a single isolated SSC 130. The minimum required separation is straightforward to determine with simulations.
If the quality of the waveguide layer and the quality of the SSC are high, there may not be sufficient amount of light scattered out of the wafer plane to report on the propagation loss. This could happen for example at stage (3) of the fabrication process when the SSC 130 is buried in the cladding materials and the cladding/air interface is created. In this case, a wafer-level equivalent of the cutback method to determine the propagation loss can be realized by patterning multiple waveguide arrays of various lengths side by side, as shown in
Once coupled into the arrays, the light is delivered as the fundamental guided mode of the waveguide towards the longitudinal arrays of SSCs 130. The light transmitted through the arrays of various lengths can be then coupled out of the wafer plane towards a detector, such as a charge-coupled device (CCD) array or a scanning probe) with another set of gratings 908. In one embodiment, as shown in
The intensity of light in the guiding layer as a function of propagation distance can be determined by measuring the intensity of the vertically scattered light using a scanning probe or a linear CCD array as shown schematically in
In summary, a method for measuring the performance of SSCs of HAMR devices on the wafer level is disclosed. An optical metrology system is deposited on a wafer and is used to determine the optical loss coefficient of spot-size converters by measuring the optical loss coefficient of the linear optical array of the optical metrology system. The method does not depend on the intensity of the in-coupled light and may be implemented at various stages of HAMR fabrication.
While the foregoing is directed to embodiments of the present invention, other and further embodiments of the invention may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof, and the scope thereof is determined by the claims that follow.