Effects of Rapid Recurrent Thermal Annealing on Giant Magnetoresistance NiFe/Ag Multilayers

NiFe/Ag multilayers were prepared by dc sputtering onto glass-ceramic substrates directly at room temperature. The samples were thermally processed by rapid recurrent thermal anneal (RRTA). We studied the effects of RRTA on giant magnetoresistance (GMR) NiFe/Ag multilayer by controlling the anneal temperature as well as the rapid anneal cycle. The samples after three RRTA cycles have a similar annealing temperature dependence of GMR responses to the ordinary annealed samples. With the increasing anneal cycle, the GMR response improved at first and then reached an unexpected high value of 9% before descent rapidly. Microstructure study shows that this effect is ascribed to the transformation of continuous NiFe layer into discontinuous one, and then into a granular like film in a step-by-step way.