Plural heat-sink layers for an On-Wafer Laser of a heat-assisted magnetic recording device

An apparatus, comprising:

• a waveguide core deposited on a substrate within a slider, the waveguide core configured to communicate light from a laser to a near-field transducer that directs energy resulting from plasmonic excitation to a recording medium;
• a structure transfer-printed and bonded to the substrate within the slider such that a major surface of the structure is substantially parallel to, and the structure is offset in a down-track direction from, a major surface of the waveguide core;
• and
• a plurality of heat sink layers deposited between the substrate and the structure and configured to provide thermal coupling between the slider and the structure and to sink heat away from the structure, wherein at least one of the plurality of heat sink layers has a different width than at least one other of the plurality of heat sink layers.

A method, comprising:

• depositing a read transducer on a substrate;
• depositing a plurality of heat sink layers over the read transducer, wherein at least one of the plurality of heat sink layers has a different width than at least one other of the plurality of heat sink layers;
• transfer printing a laser diode unit over the plurality of heat sink layers;
• and
• depositing a waveguide core over the laser diode unit, wherein the plurality of heat sink layers are configured to provide thermal coupling between the laser diode unit and the substrate and to sink heat away from the laser diode unit.