Eric Fullerton is an Endowed Chair Professor at UCSD (University of California, San Diego) in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Chemical and Nanoengineering. He also served as the Director of the Center of Memory and Recording Research (CMRR) at UCSD. After earning a PhD in physics from UCSD and working in a research position at Argonne National Laboratory, he joined IBM Almaden Research Center in 1997.
There, he conducted groundbreaking research on developing synthetic antiferromagnetic structures in recording media, which led to their introduction into products and enabled higher areal density in thin-film magnetic media. Soon, all magnetic thin-film media worldwide used these advancements. Derivations of these antiferromagnetically coupled structures continued to extend areal density and played a significant role in advancing thin-film magnetic recording media to this day.
Eric Fullerton remained with HGST after Hitachi acquired IBM’s Storage business in 2002, and in 2007 he joined the UCSD faculty. This interview focuses on his work on antiferromagnetically coupled media but also covers his current research activities at CMRR and his own work in related areas such as spintronics.
Interviewed by Tom Yamashita and Gerardo Bertero on 2025-10-20
© Computer History Museum
Note: Transcripts represent what was said in the interview. However, to enhance meaning or add clarification, interviewees have the opportunity to modify this text afterward. This may result in discrepancies between the transcript and the video. Please refer to the transcript for further information – http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/300000234
Catalog number: 300000235
Acquisition number: 2025.0193
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