Patent ID: 8218355

Claim:
A magnetoresistive element comprising: a first underlying layer having a cubic or tetragonal crystal structure oriented in a (001) plane; a first magnetic layer provided on the first underlying layer, having magnetic anisotropy perpendicular to a film surface, and having a face-centered tetragonal (fct) structure oriented in a (001) plane; a first non-magnetic layer provided on the first magnetic layer; and a second magnetic layer provided on the first non-magnetic layer, and having magnetic anisotropy perpendicular to a film surface, an in-plane lattice constant a 1 of the first underlying layer and an in-plane lattice constant a 2 of the first magnetic layer satisfying the following equation in which b is a magnitude of Burgers vector of the first magnetic layer, ν is an elastic modulus of the first magnetic layer, and hc is a thickness of the first magnetic layer, |√{square root over (2)}× a 1/2 −a 2 |/a 2 <b ×{ln( hc/b )+1}/{2π× hc ×(1+ν)}.