ANGULAR-DEPENDENCE OF THE PERPENDICULAR GIANT MAGNETORESISTANCE OF MULTILAYERS

We present measurements of the angular dependence of the giant magneto resistance in multilayers with the current applied perpendicular to th e layer plane. The samples used are (Ni80Fe20/Ag/Co/Ag) multilayers sa ndwiched between superconducting underlayers and overlayers. The angle between the magnetizations of the Ni80Fe20 and Co layers is continuou sly varied. We find that the current-perpendicular-to-the-plane magnet oresistance of these multilayers varies as 1-a cos(2)(theta/2)+b cos(4 )(theta/2), where theta is the angle between the magnetization of succ essive magnetic layers and bla is between 0.1 and 0.3. We discuss the theoretical interpretation of this variation.