Record head for thermally assisted magnetic recording

Abstract

A record head for the thermally assisted magnetic recording on a storage medium. The head has an inductive section, which includes a magnetic circuit having a record flux guide ending in a record pole, and an optical section, which includes an optical guide ending in an optical outlet. The optical guide is arranged beside the magnetic circuit and is an optical layer transparent to a selected wavelength. The optical layer is interposed between two cladding layers, of which one is formed by the record flux guide of the magnetic circuit and the other is formed by a layer having an index of refraction smaller than the index of refraction of the optical layer. The record head makes it possible to minimize the time that elapse between the moment of maximal energy absorption in the medium and the moment of recording on the medium in a thermally assisted recording process.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.