A composite material fabricated using a novel process and materials. The piezoelectric and magnetostrictive layers of the composite material are coated, layered, and bonded using a process known as LTTLP bonding. The resulting magnetoelectric composite fibers are bonded to a polyimide film based copper flexible circuit using a room temperature curing epoxy. The sensor that results is an MEMFC that outperforms conventionally fabricated MEMFCs.

The invention relates to an actuator (1) comprising a housing (8), a coil (29) and an armature (2) which interacts with a tappet (30) and a spring, the armature plate (3) thereof being arranged to lie opposite an armature counterpiece (16), and said actuator (1) comprising at least one magnetostrictively-active component. According to the invention, an actuator (1) is provided with which large actuating paths can be travelled at high actuating forces. This is achieved by the actuator (1) additionally being designed to act as a solenoid.

An improved method for etching a magnetic tunneling junction (MTJ) structure is achieved. A stack of MTJ layers is provided on a bottom electrode. The MTJ stack is patterned to form a MTJ device wherein sidewall damage or sidewall redeposition is formed on sidewalls of the MTJ device. A dielectric layer is deposited on the MTJ device and the bottom electrode. The dielectric layer is etched away using ion beam etching at an angle relative to vertical of greater than 50 degrees wherein the dielectric layer on the sidewalls is etched away and wherein sidewall damage or sidewall redeposition is also removed and wherein some of the dielectric layer remains on horizontal surfaces of the bottom electrode.

A semiconductor process integrates three bridge circuits, each include magnetoresistive sensors coupled as a Wheatstone bridge on a single chip to sense a magnetic field in three orthogonal directions. The process includes various deposition and etch steps forming the magnetoresistive sensors and a plurality of flux guides on one of the three bridge circuits for transferring a Z axis magnetic field onto sensors orientated in the XY plane.