Modeling of Nanostructured Magnetic Field Sensors

A panoramic view of recent nanostructured magnetic field sensors has been provided, focusing on the modeling of some examples of device concepts, with possible applications in high-tech sectors including automotive, aerospace, Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and medical fields. In particular, this chapter provides a description, from physical basic principles to numerical simulation, of magnetoresistive nanosensors based on anisotropic magnetoresistance (AMR) or planar Hall effect (PHE), novel sensing elements exploiting ferromagnetic resonance (FMR) in nanopatterned magnetic thin films, and miniaturized Hall probes. Specific attention has been devoted to their application in the detection of magnetic nanoparticles or microbeads for biomedical and biochemistry applications, sectors in which very high-sensitivity and submicrometric resolution are required.