Fabrication of magnetic tunnel junctions with a metastable bcc Co₃Mn disordered alloy as a bottom electrode

Abstract

We fabricated MgO barrier magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) with a Co3Mn alloy bottom and FeCoB top electrodes. The (001)-oriented epitaxial films of the metastable bcc Co3Mn disordered alloys obtained showed saturation magnetization of approximately 1640 emu/cm3. The transmission electron microscopy showed that the MgO barrier was epitaxially grown on the Co3Mn electrode. Tunnel magnetoresistance of approximately 150% was observed at room temperature after the annealing of MTJs at 350◦C, indicating that bcc Co3Mn alloys have relatively high spin polarization.