GMR

GMR may refer to:

GMR (magazine)

GMR was a monthly magazine on video games that was published by Ziff-Davis — the publisher of such magazines as PC Magazine, Electronic Gaming Monthly, and Computer Gaming World (later Games for Windows: The Official Magazine). GMR was launched in February 2003, being sold in only the Electronics Boutique (EB) chain of video game stores. The magazine was unusual among multiconsole magazines in that it covered PC as well as console games, as well as its minimalistic cover art, and, in its last few months, its shift in focus toward promotion of less mainstream titles. It lasted exactly two years, as the 25th and last issue (which was only sent to subscribers) was the February 2005 edition (though prints were limited and not even all subscribers received the final issue).

As the magazine was funded by Electronics Boutique, the magazine stopped circulation when Gamestop merged with EB Games, as Gamestop already had its own magazine, Game Informer. The fates of its entire staff remain unknown, although James "Milkman" Mielke and Andrew "Skip" Pfister have transferred to the 1Up.com Network online.

Giant magnetoresistance

Giant magnetoresistance (GMR) is a quantum mechanical magnetoresistance effect observed in thin-film structures composed of alternating ferromagnetic and non-magnetic conductive layers. The 2007 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Albert Fert and Peter Grünberg for the discovery of GMR.

The effect is observed as a significant change in the electrical resistance depending on whether the magnetization of adjacent ferromagnetic layers are in a parallel or an antiparallel alignment. The overall resistance is relatively low for parallel alignment and relatively high for antiparallel alignment. The magnetization direction can be controlled, for example, by applying an external magnetic field. The effect is based on the dependence of electron scattering on the spin orientation.

The main application of GMR is magnetic field sensors, which are used to read data in hard disk drives, biosensors, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and other devices. GMR multilayer structures are also used in magnetoresistive random-access memory (MRAM) as cells that store one bit of information.