Physicists from RIKEN have developed a new magnetic material that can significantly increase memory storage density and data recording speed in computers. Their research is published in the journal Nature Communications.
Data storage uses materials that create different magnetic patterns across the surface. Typically, ferromagnets such as iron and cobalt are used for this purpose. However, they are not ideal due to the possibility of unwanted magnetic influence on neighboring regions, which can lead to data loss.
Antiferromagnetic materials, in which the magnetic fields of neighboring atoms are oriented in opposite directions, can solve these problems. However, for encoding and reading data they require special methods.
Physicists at RIKEN have demonstrated for the first time the anomalous Hall effect in an antiferromagnetic metal containing ruthenium and oxygen. This material is easy to fabricate as thin films, making it attractive for practical use in computing 'uterah.