A magnetostrictive element that can exhibit a sufficiently large magnetostriction amount in a longitudinal direction is formed of a single crystal alloy magnetostrictive material. The magnetostrictive element has a shape of a plate-shaped rectangular parallelepiped, a main plane of the plate-shaped rectangular parallelepiped includes a plurality of magnetic domains that are regions where atomic magnetic moments are arranged in the same direction and whose width is 10 m to 200 m, and a total area rate of a magnetic domain where an angle difference between a lateral direction of the main plane and a direction of the magnetic moments of the magnetic domain is 10 or less to the main plane is 60% to 100%.

The present invention relates to a method of fabricating a shape-changeable magnetic member comprising a plurality of segments with each segment being able to be magnetized with a desired magnitude and orientation of magnetization, to a method of producing a shape changeable magnetic member composed of a plurality of segments and to a shape changeable magnetic member.

Apparatuses for etching metal by depositing a material reactive with a metal to be etched and a halogen to form a volatile species and exposing the substrate to a halogen-containing gas and activation gas to etch the substrate are provided. Deposited materials may include silicon, germanium, titanium, carbon, tin, and combinations thereof. Apparatuses are suitable for fabricating MRAM structures and may be used to integrate ALD and ALE processes without breaking vacuum.

Disclosed is a flexible tactile actuator including a tactile transmitter configured to be flexible and including magnetic particles capable of being polarized in response to an external magnetic field and a matrix layer including the magnetic particles, a magnetic field generator disposed below the tactile transmitter and configured to generate a magnetic field in the tactile transmitter, and an elastic member provided in a shape of a film, having at least a portion in surface contact with the magnetic field generator, and attached to be in surface contact with one of a top surface and a bottom surface of the tactile transmitter.

A method of fabricating a shape-changeable magnetic member comprising a plurality of segments with each segment being able to be magnetized with a desired magnitude and orientation of magnetization, to a method of producing a shape changeable magnetic member composed of a plurality of segments and to a shape changeable magnetic member.

In a method of manufacturing a piezoelectric device, during an isolation formation step, a supporting substrate has a piezoelectric thin film formed on its front with a compressive stress film present on its back. The compressive stress film compresses the surface on a piezoelectric single crystal substrate side of the supporting substrate, and the piezoelectric thin film compresses the back of the supporting substrate, which is opposite to the surface on the piezoelectric single crystal substrate side. Thus, the compressive stress produced by the compressive stress film and that produced by the piezoelectric thin film are balanced in the supporting substrate, which causes the supporting substrate to be free of warpage and remain flat. A driving force that induces isolation in the isolation formation step is gasification of the implanted ionized element rather than the compressive stress to the isolation plane produced by the piezoelectric thin film.

There is provided a magnetic deformable member that is deformable upon application of magnetism, and that has a front surface that projects toward the side opposite to a magnet when such a magnet is placed. The front surface provides variations in tactile feel or viewability for humans by providing a soft tactile feel. A magnetic deformable member 10 includes: a flexible sheet; a back plate made of a hard material and stacked on the flexible sheet; a gel charged inside a space between the flexible sheet and the back plate; and a magnetic member having an annular shape as viewed in plan in a direction that is perpendicular to a front surface of the flexible sheet and having a length in the perpendicular direction. The magnetic member is secured to the flexible sheet, and disposed in the gel.

A piezoelectric substrate manufacturing device that includes first and electrodes that face each other with a piezoelectric substrate interposed therebetween; a cover that surrounds the second electrode such that the leading end of the second electrode is exposed; a supply unit that supplies a processing gas to an internal space of the cover; a processing unit that performs surface processing on the piezoelectric substrate by applying a voltage between the first and second electrodes causing the processing gas to change into plasma; a detector that is provided outside the cover with its relative position fixed with respect to the second electrode; a measurement unit that measures the thickness of the piezoelectric substrate using the detector; a driving unit that changes the relative positions of the first and second electrodes; and a control unit that controls the supply unit, the processing unit, the measurement unit, and the driving unit.

A sub-micrometer pressure sensor including a multilayered magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) pillar containing a magnetostrictive material layer above or below a magnetic free layer of the multilayered MTJ pillar is provided. Advanced patterning allows for scaling of the multilayered MTJ pillar down to 25 nm or below which enables the formation of a large array of extremely high resolution pressure sensors. By varying the thickness of the magnetostrictive material layer, the sensitivity of the pressure sensor can be fine tuned. Unique magnetostrictive materials in the multilayered MTJ pillar will alter the device current with the input of external pressure. Furthermore, unique arrays with much smaller critical elements can be organized in differential sensing arrangements of the multilayered MTJ pillar with pressure sensing capability that can outperform current piezoelectric based pressure sensing arrays.

Nano-actuators having a helical member formed with a ferromagnetic shape memory alloy (FSMA) are disclosed that are elastically deformable between a compressed state and an expanded state by the application of a magnetic field. The nano-actuators may include a ferromagnetic head portion, that may be formed from the FSMA or from another material. A thin biocompatible external layer provides a platform for attaching a ligand that is selected to bind with a target cell type, for example, a target cancer cell. The nano-actuators are magnetically propelled to the target cells, and oscillated and/or rotated to mechanically damage the target cells to induce apoptosis. The nano-actuators may be formed by electro deposition of the FSMA into a nano-helical template.