Headway/TDK Assigned Patent

Headway Technologies, Inc., Milpitas, CA, a subsidiary of TDK Corp., has been assigned a patent (8,654,618) developed by three co-inventors for “thermal assisted magnetic recording structure with head-disk interference sensor for head-disk interference and temperature rise sensing.”

The co-inventors are Kowang Liu, Fremont, CA, Xuhui Jin, and Xiaohua Lou, San Jose, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A DFH (dynamic fly height) equipped TAMR (Thermal Assisted Magnetic Recording) write head uses optical-laser excited surface plasmons to locally heat a magnetic recording medium so that writing is enabled, while a DFH heater allows the head to fly very close to the magnetic medium. The write head includes an integral HDI sensor with a narrow track width for high spatial resolution. The HDI sensor is calibrated to obtain a relationship between its resistance and heater power. When the TAMR head is operated, measurement of high frequency voltage across the HDI sensor as a function of heater power indicates impending touchdowns, while use of the calibrated resistance curve enables the sensor to monitor temperature variations within components of the TAMR write head.”

The patent application was filed on Sept. 14, 2012 (13/617,487).