Steady State and Dynamics of Joule Heating in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions Observed via the Temperature Dependence of RKKY Coupling

Abstract

Even spintronic devices generate heat. Measuring the temperature in a nanoscale magnetic tunnel junction is important for developing next-generation technologies such as magnetic random-access memory (MRAM), as well as for distinguishing the underlying physical phenomena. The authors use interlayer exchange coupling to monitor a complex thermally assisted MRAM stack, probing Joule heating in real time. They separate the contribution of temperature from that of spin-transfer torque, and find that in some situations the magnetic moment rotates instead of switching.