Perpendicular giant magnetoresistance of Co/Cu multilayers on grooved substrates: Systematic analysis of the temperature dependence of spin-dependent scattering

The giant magnetoresistance of Co/Cu multilayers deposited at an angle onto grooved substrates is measured with the current perpendicular to the layer plane. The spin-dependent scattering parameters due to magnetic bulk and interface scattering are determined as a function of temperature, which is done by comparing our experiments with the two-channel model. We find that the decrease of the magnetoresistance from 4.2 K to room temperature is mainly due to an increase of the bulk resistivites of the Co and Cu layers, while the temperature dependence of the interface resistance and the spin-asymmetry parameters for electron scattering is small.