Patent ID: 9542960
Date: 2017-01-10
CPC Classifications: G11B

Claim:
1. A thermally-assisted magnetic recording head comprising: a medium facing surface configured to face a recording medium; a coil for producing a magnetic field corresponding to data to be written on the recording medium; a main pole having a front end face located in the medium facing surface; a waveguide including a core and a cladding, the core allowing light to propagate therethrough, the cladding being provided around the core; a plasmon generator having a near-field light generating surface located in the medium facing surface; and a first side shield and a second side shield each formed of a magnetic material, wherein the main pole is configured to pass a magnetic flux corresponding to the magnetic field produced by the coil, and to produce from the front end face a write magnetic field for use to write the data on the recording medium, the plasmon generator is configured to excite a surface plasmon on the plasmon generator based on the light propagating through the core, and to generate near-field light from the near-field light generating surface based on the surface plasmon, the front end face of the main pole includes a first end face portion, and a second end face portion contiguous with the first end face portion, the first end face portion and the second end face portion being located in the medium facing surface, the second end face portion is greater than the first end face portion in width in a track width direction, the near-field light generating surface, the first end face portion and the second end face portion are arranged in this order along a direction of travel of the recording medium, the main pole includes a first portion and a second portion, the first portion including the first end face portion, the second portion including the second end face portion, the first side shield has a first side shield end face located in the medium facing surface, the second side shield has a second side shield end face located in the medium facing surface, and the first side shield end face and the second side shield end face are located on opposite sides of at least part of the near-field light generating surface and at least part of the first end face portion in the track width direction such that the at least part of the near-field light generating surface and the at least part of the first end face portion are interposed between the first and second side shield end faces.