Near-Field Transducer for Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording

Modern hard drives store data using the polarity of billions of tiny magnets to represent the corresponding bits of information. The number of magnets that fit onto a device's disk or platter determines storage density. To further increase storage density, a more coercive magnet must be used, requiring a stronger magnetic field. Eventually, it will become impossible to create a magnetic field strong enough to permanently affect the data, which is a problem for hard drive manufacturers.

Heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) solves this problem by selectively heating the magnets above the Curie temperature, making them lose their coercivity so that a weaker magnetic field can change the data. Researchers at Purdue University have developed a new, near-field transducer for HAMR applications that could increase the storage capacity of high-density hard drives. Disks using HAMR technology could increase the limit of magnetic storage by more than a factor of 100 and create densities of 50 terabits per square inch.

Advantages:

-Higher magnetic storage densities

TRL: 4

Intellectual Property:

Keywords: Heat-assisted magnetic recording, HAMR, high-density hard drives, magnetic storage, storage density, near-field transducer, Curie temperature, coercive magnet, hard drive manufacturers, magnetic field, Circuits, Computer Hardware, Electrical Engineering, Sensors