An experimental approach for obtaining perpendicular FePt-SiOx thin films with a large height to diameter ratio FePt(L1 0 ) columnar grains is presented in this work. The microstructure for FePt-SiOx composite thin films as a function of oxide volume fraction, substrate temperature, and film thickness is studied by plan view and cross section TEM. The relations between processing, microstructure, epitaxial texture, and magnetic properties are discussed. By tuning the thickness of the magnetic layer and the volume fraction of oxide in the film at a sputtering temperature of 410 C, a 16 nm thick perpendicular FePt film with $8 nm diameter of FePt grains was obtained. The height to diameter ratio of the FePt grains was as large as 2. Ordering at lower temperature can be achieved by introducing a Ag sacrificial layer. FePt(L1 0 ) is considered to be one of the most promising materials for ultrahigh density recording applications. [1][2][3][4] For achieving high density, the film media needs to be granular in nature, of small and uniform sized grains with a nonmagnetic phase at the grain boundaries. [5][6][7] Well defined carbon regions at the grain boundaries with small magnetic grain sizes have been achieved in FePt(L1 0 )-C films. However, non-columnar film microstructures in these films leads to a layer with new secondary grains, leading to undesired magnetic properties. 8 The difficulty in obtaining columnar growth of L1 0 FePt grains with large height to diameter ratios lies in perhaps the high surface energy associated with the material choice.In this work, an experimental method for obtaining perpendicular FePt-SiOx thin films with large height to diameter ratio FePt(L1 0 ) columnar grains is presented. It was found that the microstructure of composite films can be influenced by not only the deposition pressure, temperature, and oxide volume fractions, but also the choice of matrix material and thickness of the thin film.FePt/oxide multilayers and MgO/Ta underlayers were deposited on Si substrates by RF sputtering. The base pressure was approximately 5 Â 10 À7 Torr and the argon pressure during deposition was maintained at 10 mTorr. The MgO/Ta underlayers were deposited at room temperature; the FePt/ oxide multilayers were fabricated by the alternating sputtering of the Fe 55 Pt 45 alloy and the SiOx targets on a heated substrate. The substrate temperature was varied between 370 C to 475 C during the multilayer deposition. X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy were used to study the texture and microstructure of the films. An alternating gradient force magnetometer (AGFM) and a polar magneto-optical Kerr effect looper (MOKE) were used to investigate the magnetic properties.The cross section TEM images in Fig. 1 show the microstructure of FePt-SiOx composite films as a function of oxide volume fraction (OVF). For this set of samples, the FePt/ SiOx multilayers deposition temperature was maintained at 410 C and the FePt film thickness was fixed at 16 nm. As shown in the figure, in the low OVF f...