(NIST: Gaithersburg, Maryland) -- Materials researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, together with colleagues from IBM and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have pushed the measurement of thin films to the edge—literally—to produce the first data on how the edges of metallic thin films contribute to their magnetic properties. Their results may affect the design of future nanoscale electronics.

Ferromagnetic thin films of metallic materials—ranging in thickness from fractions of a nanometer to several micrometers—are layered in patterns on a substrate (such as silicon) during the manufacture of many microelectronic devices that use magnetic properties, such as computer hard drives.

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