X-ray diffraction characterization of stress and crystallographic texture in thin film media

X-ray diffraction was used to measure the stress and the in-plane crystallographic texture of Co alloy films on grooved substrates. The preference for the c-axis to lie parallel to the groove direction was quantified. A small in-plane stress was measured which displayed an anisotropy between the two directions. The magnitude of this stress appears to be large enough (according to a simple calculation) to contribute to observed coercive anisotropies. The techniques used for extracting the in-plane crystallographic texture and the value of the in-plane stress from the X-ray measurements are discussed.>