Patent ID: 8630152

Claim:
A thermally assisted perpendicular magnetic recording system for a magnetic recording medium, comprising: a slider having parallel top and bottom surfaces, separated from one another along a Z direction, said bottom surface being an air bearing surface (ABS); between said top and bottom surfaces, a perpendicular magnetic pole (PMP) that terminates at said ABS; a laser diode (LD) that is operating in TE (Transverse Electric) mode mounted on said top surface, disposed so as to emit a TE mode light beam in said Z direction; an optical wave-guide (WG), operating in TE mode that extends from said top surface towards said lower surface along said Z direction, aligned for optimum coupling to said TE mode light beam; a self-focusing gap plasmon generator (SGPG), oriented to lie along said Z direction between said PMP and said WG whereby said SGPG has a WG-facing surface and a PMP-facing surface that are separated from one another along a Y direction that is perpendicular to said Z direction; said SGPG comprising first, second, and third sections, that are interconnected, each section having at least two inner surfaces and each section further comprising a pair of metallic regions, that are a separation distance apart, connected to one another through a dielectric region along an X direction that is perpendicular to both said Z direction and said Y direction; said separation distance decreasing both when going from said WG-facing surface to said PMP-facing surface as well as when going towards said ABS along said Z direction; and wherein said WG is displaced from said SGPG in said Y direction, by up to 0.1 microns, and overlaps said SGPG, terminating between 0 and 1 microns from said ABS, whereby edge coupling of radiation, occurs between said SGPG and said WG; whereby optical radiation propagating through said WG in said TE mode is coupled into said SGPG, emerging at said ABS as focused plasmon radiation that heats said magnetic recording medium over an area measuring less than 50 nm across and located within 0.1 microns from said PMP.