2013 Volume 37 Issue 3-2 Pages 111-114
A technique of light energy transfer for thermally assisted magnetic recording must be the crucial breakthrough not only to confine an optical near-field spot onto a medium efficiently but also to prevent the temperature from rising in a HDD recording head. A waveguide with a plasmon antenna is investigated using a finite-difference time-domain simulation. For the results, an optical near-field antenna with an apex radius of 12 nm and a protruding structure can confine a light down to 8.5 nm full width at half maximum in intensity, even on a continuous medium. Matching the wavenumber of the incident light to that of a surface plasmon polariton by adjusting the incident angle is a useful technique to transfer energy. The efficiency of light delivery with the plasmon waveguide is 60% greater than the efficiency without the plasmon waveguide.
