Robert Fontana

Last updated
Robert E. Fontana Jr.
Robert E. Fontana, 2005.png
Bob Fontana in 2005
Born (1947-07-17) July 17, 1947 (age 76)
Champaign, Illinois
Alma mater Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Occupation(s)Engineer, Physicist
Employer(s) Texas Instruments, IBM, Hitachi GST
SpouseBarbara A Francis (1983 - )
Awards

Robert E Fontana is an engineer, physicist, and author who is noted for his contributions in the areas of magnetic recording and data storage on hard disk drives (HDD) and on digital tape recorders. [1] His work has concentrated on developing thin film processing techniques for nano-fabrication of magnetic devices including Giant Magnetoresistance read heads now used universally in magnetic recording. Much of his career was with IBM in San Jose, California. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Contents

Background and education

Fontana grew up in Champaign, Illinois. [2] He received a Bachelor's, a Master's, and a Ph.D. degrees all from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Department of Electrical Engineering in 1969, 1971, and 1975, respectively. [3] Fontana completed his Ph.D. on the optical and magnetic properties of thin films under the direction of Professor David J. Epstein.

Career

Fontana joined Texas instruments in Dallas, Texas, in 1975 to work on magnetic bubble memory devices. He had been originally introduced to magnetic bubble memory in 1970 in an IEEE lecture by Andrew Eschenfelder [4] of IBM. [5] He was encouraged in this work by Dennis Bus [6] who was also a visiting scientist at MIT and by Dean Toombs, the VP in charge of bubbles at TI [7]

In 1981, Fontana joined the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California, to work on thin film magnetic recording heads. He made significant contributions in the development of processing of both inductive write heads and three generations of magnetoresistive read heads. [8] [9] These included Anisotropic Magnetoresistance (AMR) heads, Giant Magnetoresistance (GMR) heads. and Tunnel magnetoresistance (TMR) heads. [10] Fontana's colleagues and collaborators included Ta Lin Hsu, Ching Tsang, Christopher Bajorek, Heiner Sussner, Prakash Kasiraj, Bob Scranton, Rick Dill. [5]

From 2003 to 2007, Fontana worked for Hitachi GST (a result of Hitachi's purchase of IBM's disk-drive division). His work at Hitachi GST at that time focussed on nano structure e-beam fabrication and on novel flux detecting sensors including all-metal CPP GMR sensors that scale well to very small device sizes. [1] [11]

In 2008, Fontana re-joined the IBM Almaden Research Center to work on heads for magnetic tape recording. [1] In particular he contributed to the development and implementation of TMR read heads suitable for the harsh tape recording environment. [12] In addition, Fontana published several papers with S. Hetzler and G. Decad examining the global market and technology outlook for data storage technologies in general comparing solid-state, optical, hard disk drive, and tape. [13]

During his career, Fontana played an important role in several technical societies including the National Academy of Engineering and the National Research Council. In particular, he played an influential role with the IEEE Magnetics Society encouraged by Denis Mee, Mark Kryder, and Dave Thompson. Fontana served on the 'MagSoc' Administrative Committee and in various roles supporting IEEE conferences. For example, Fontana was Conference Chair for the joint MMM/Intermag conference in 2004. [14] In 2001 and 2002, he served as president of the IEEE Magnetics Society [15] and was formally recognized for his long-standing contributions to the Society in 2017. [16]

Fontana was a Consulting Professor at Stanford University Materials Science and Engineering from 2006 to 2011 [17]

Fontana retired from IBM in July 2021. He lives in San Jose, California.[ citation needed ]

Awards and recognition

Fontana has been recognized internationally and received multiple awards for his contributions to magnetic recording technology and his leadership in the engineering community:

Patents and publications

Fontana is the author or coauthor of 141 US. patents [22] as well as 61 publications in scientific and engineering journals. [1] [23] The majority of these are in the area of thin film processing applied to nanometer-scale magnetic transducers for magnetic data storage in hard disk drives and digital tape recorders. Several more recent publications address the status and outlook comparing solid-state, optical, HDD and tape storage technologies [13] [24]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Disk storage</span> General category of storage mechanisms

Disk storage is a data storage mechanism based on a rotating disk. The recording employs various electronic, magnetic, optical, or mechanical changes to the disk's surface layer. A disk drive is a device implementing such a storage mechanism. Notable types are hard disk drives (HDD), containing one or more non-removable rigid platters; the floppy disk drive (FDD) and its removable floppy disk; and various optical disc drives (ODD) and associated optical disc media.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hard disk drive</span> Electro-mechanical data storage device

A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating platters coated with magnetic material. The platters are paired with magnetic heads, usually arranged on a moving actuator arm, which read and write data to the platter surfaces. Data is accessed in a random-access manner, meaning that individual blocks of data can be stored and retrieved in any order. HDDs are a type of non-volatile storage, retaining stored data when powered off. Modern HDDs are typically in the form of a small rectangular box.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Disk read-and-write head</span> Small, movable part of a disk drive

A disk read-and-write head is the small part of a disk drive which moves above the disk platter and transforms the platter's magnetic field into electric current or, vice versa, transforms electric current into magnetic field. The heads have gone through a number of changes over the years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drum memory</span> Magnetic data storage device

Drum memory was a magnetic data storage device invented by Gustav Tauschek in 1932 in Austria. Drums were widely used in the 1950s and into the 1960s as computer memory.

IBM manufactured magnetic disk storage devices from 1956 to 2003, when it sold its hard disk drive business to Hitachi. Both the hard disk drive (HDD) and floppy disk drive (FDD) were invented by IBM and as such IBM's employees were responsible for many of the innovations in these products and their technologies. The basic mechanical arrangement of hard disk drives has not changed since the IBM 1301. Disk drive performance and characteristics are measured by the same standards now as they were in the 1950s. Few products in history have enjoyed such spectacular declines in cost and physical size along with equally dramatic improvements in capacity and performance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Magnetic storage</span> Recording of data on a magnetizable medium

Magnetic storage or magnetic recording is the storage of data on a magnetized medium. Magnetic storage uses different patterns of magnetisation in a magnetizable material to store data and is a form of non-volatile memory. The information is accessed using one or more read/write heads.

Density is a measure of the quantity of information bits that can be stored on a given length of track, area of the surface, or in a given volume of a computer storage medium. Generally, higher density is more desirable, for it allows more data to be stored in the same physical space. Density therefore has a direct relationship to storage capacity of a given medium. Density also generally affects the performance within a particular medium, as well as price.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of hard disk drives</span> Development of computer data storage

In 1953, IBM recognized the immediate application for what it termed a "Random Access File" having high capacity and rapid random access at a relatively low cost. After considering technologies such as wire matrices, rod arrays, drums, drum arrays, etc., the engineers at IBM's San Jose California laboratory invented the hard disk drive. The disk drive created a new level in the computer data hierarchy, then termed Random Access Storage but today known as secondary storage, less expensive and slower than main memory but faster and more expensive than tape drives.

John Mason "Jack" Harker was an inventor, mechanical engineer, and product and program manager who pioneered development of disk storage systems. Starting as a member of the original team that developed the first disk storage system, he went on to develop IBM Direct Access Storage products for the next 35 years. Over that time, Harker was twice director of the IBM San Jose Storage Laboratories, an IBM Fellow, and an IEEE Fellow. He retired from IBM in 1987 and died in 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yoshihiro Shiroishi</span>

Yoshihiro Shiroishi was born in 1951 in Tokyo, Japan. He is a Chief Architect and Technical Advisor at the Hitachi Research & Dev. Group, Tokyo, Japan. Shiroishi was named Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in 2015 for leadership in the development of high density magnetic recording technologies and devices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bruce Gurney</span> American physicist and inventor

Bruce Alvin Gurney was an American physicist responsible for pioneering advances in magnetic recording. In particular, he was central to the development of the giant magnetoresistance (GMR) sensors first used in hard disk drives in 1997.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Denis Mee</span> British data storage engineer and author (1927–2023)

Charles Denis Mee was a British-American engineer, physicist, and author who was noted for his contributions in the areas of magnetic recording and data storage on hard disk drives (HDD). A large part of his career was with IBM in San Jose California. He is the author or editor of several books on magnetic recording.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christopher H. Bajorek</span> Data storage engineer, inventor, technology leader (b. 1943, d. -)

Christopher Henry Bajorek is a data storage engineer noted for his leadership in developing and implementing magnetoresistive sensors into magnetic stripe readers, tape drives and hard disk drives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mason Lamar Williams</span> American engineer, physicist, and inventor in Magnetic Recording

Mason Lamar Williams III was an engineer and physicist, noted for his contributions in the areas of magnetic recording and data storage on hard disk drives (HDD). A large part of his career was with the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California. After retiring, Williams played a major role in the restoration and demonstration of the IBM RAMAC at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Mallary</span> American data storage engineer, inventor, and author

Michael L. Mallary is an engineer, physicist, inventor, and author who is noted for his contributions in the areas of magnetic recording and data storage on hard disk drives (HDD). His work has concentrated on developing and optimizing magnetic components to maximize data storage density. In particular, he is responsible to inventing the 'trailing-shield' write head used universally in modern HDDs. Mallary is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and recipient of the IEEE Magnetics Society Achievement Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neal Bertram</span> American physicist, teacher, and author

Neal Bertram is a physicist noted for his contributions to the theory of magnetic recording. From 1968 to 1985, he worked for Ampex Corporation in Redwood City. From 1985 to 2004, he was an Endowed Chair Professor at the Center for Memory and Recording Research (CMRR), University of California at San Diego. He is the author of the book "Theory of Magnetic Recording". He is an elected Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. In 2003, he won the IEEE Reynold B. Johnson Information Storage Systems Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Thompson (engineer)</span> American data storage engineer and inventor

David A. Thompson is an American electrical engineer and inventor with a long career at IBM. He is noted for his many contributions to magnetic recording technology. Thompson was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for the invention and development of the thin-film inductive head and the magnetoresistive read head. These heads are now ubiquitous in all hard-disk drives and magnetic tape recorders.

Bernard Dieny is a research scientist and an entrepreneur. He is Chief Scientist at SPINTEC, a CEA/CNRS/UGA research laboratory that he co-founded in 2002 in Grenoble, France. He is also co-founder of two startup companies: Crocus Technology on MRAM and magnetic sensors in 2006 and EVADERIS on circuits design in 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Bogy</span> American professor of mechanical engineering

David Beauregard Bogy is the William S. Floyd, Jr. Distinguished Professor of the Graduate School at the University of California, Berkeley (UCB). He is also the founder and head of the Computer Mechanics Laboratory (CML) at UCB.. He has made particular contributions in air-bearing analysis and design for the sliders that support the read/write heads in hard disk drives (HDD).

Albert Smiley Hoagland had a long career on the development of hard disk drives (HDD) starting with the IBM RAMAC. From 1956 to 1984, he was with IBM in San Jose, California, and then, from 1984 to 2005, he was the director of the Institute for Information Storage Technology at Santa Clara University. He wrote the first book on Digital Magnetic Recording. Hoagland played a central role in the preservation and restoration of the IBM RAMAC now displayed at the Computer History Museum, Mountain View, California. He died in Portland, Oregon, on 1 October 2022.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 IEEE Xplore author profile: Robert E. Fontana
  2. 1 2 "The IEEE Technical Field Awards [Awards]". IEEE Spectrum. 37 (8): 58–70. August 17, 2000. doi:10.1109/MSPEC.2000.8736474 – via IEEE Xplore.
  3. 1 2 "Distinguished Lecturers For 2005", IEEE Magnetics Society Newsletter, Volume 44, No. 4, p. 9, October 2005
  4. ↑ Illingworth, Shaun R. "Eschenfelder, Andrew". oralhistory.rutgers.edu.
  5. 1 2 3 "Magnetics Society Achievement Award: acceptance speech", IEEE Magnetics Society Newsletter, Volume 44, No. 4, p. 16, October 2005
  6. ↑ del Alamo, Jesus A. (May 17, 2019). "In Memory of Dennis D. Buss [In Memoriam]". IEEE Solid-State Circuits Magazine. 11 (2): 139. doi: 10.1109/MSSC.2019.2909223 . S2CID   197435235.
  7. ↑ Schuyten, Peter J. (August 4, 1978). "T.I.Sets Bubble Memory". The New York Times– via NYTimes.com.
  8. ↑ Dieny, Bernard; Gurney, Bruce; Pinarbasi, Mustafa; Speriosu, Virgil (May 30, 2019). "Invention, Development and Commercialization of GMR Heads oral history panel" (PDF) (Interview). Interviewed by Chris Bajorek. Computer History Museum. p. 29.
  9. ↑ "Computer History Museum: Oral History of Frederick (Rick) H. Dill, Interviewed by: David Laws, Recorded: June 11, 2015" (PDF).
  10. ↑ Childress, Jeffrey R.; Fontana, Robert E. (2005). "Magnetic recording read head sensor technology". Comptes Rendus. Physique. 6 (9): 997–1012. Bibcode:2005CRPhy...6..997C. doi:10.1016/j.crhy.2005.11.001. ISSN   1878-1535.
  11. ↑ Childress, J. R.; Carey, M. J.; Maat, S.; Smith, N.; Fontana, R. E.; Druist, D.; Carey, K.; Katine, J. A.; Robertson, N.; Boone, T. D.; Alex, M.; Moore, J.; Tsang, C. H. (January 17, 2008). "All-Metal Current-Perpendicular-to-Plane Giant Magnetoresistance Sensors for Narrow-Track Magnetic Recording". IEEE Transactions on Magnetics. 44 (1): 90–94. Bibcode:2008ITM....44...90C. doi:10.1109/TMAG.2007.911019. S2CID   29454559 – via IEEE Xplore.
  12. ↑ Fontana, R. E.; Biskeborn, R. G.; Lantz, M.; Decad, G. M. (2019). "Tape in the cloud—Technology developments and roadmaps supporting 80 TB cartridge capacities". AIP Advances. 9 (12). Bibcode:2019AIPA....9l5222F. doi:10.1063/1.5130404. ISSN   2158-3226.
  13. 1 2 Fontana, R. E.; Decad, G. M.; Hetzler, S. R. (2015). "Volumetric density trends (TB/in.3) for storage components: TAPE, hard disk drives, NAND, and Blu-ray". Journal of Applied Physics. 117 (17). doi:10.1063/1.4906208. ISSN   0021-8979.
  14. ↑ Fontana, R.E. (July 17, 2004). "Chairman's Preface". IEEE Transactions on Magnetics. 40 (4): 1991. Bibcode:2004ITM....40.1991F. doi:10.1109/TMAG.2004.832661 – via IEEE Xplore.
  15. ↑ "IEEE Magnetics Society Presidents, 1965-2019".
  16. 1 2 "Previous recipients of the Distinguished Service Award". www.ieeemagnetics.org.
  17. ↑ University, Office of the Registrar-Stanford. "Stanford Bulletin - Stanford University". web.stanford.edu.
  18. ↑ "IEEE Magnetics Society Newsletter July 1996". ieeemagnetics.org.
  19. ↑ "IEEE Cledo Brunetti Award recipients" (PDF). Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
  20. ↑ "Dr. Robert E. Fontana, Jr". NAE Website.
  21. ↑ "2005 Achievement Award". ieeemagnetics.org.
  22. ↑ "Robert E. Fontana Inventions, Patents and Patent Applications - Justia Patents Search". patents.justia.com.
  23. ↑ "Researchgate: publications: Robert E. Fontana".
  24. ↑ "R. Fontana, G. Decad, "R. Fontana, G. Decad, "A Ten Year (2008-2017) Storage Landscape: LTO Tape Media, HDD, NAND" MSST 2018, Santa Clara, May 14-16, 2018" (PDF).
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