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We have carried out a combined experimental and computer simulation study to specify and identify candidate films to support high areal density, thermally-assisted magnetic recording. The motivation of this work is to utilize the enhanced writability of very high coercivity materials that thermal assistance can provide. Media with high coercivity (and anisotropy K(sub u)) are known to be essential to achieve a sufficiently high ratio of K(sub u)V/k(sub B)T necessary to maintain magnetic stability at temperature T in media switching units (grains; single domains) of volume V. Nominally, we expect V infinity D(exp -3/2, where D is the medium bit density per unit area in recording. A micromagnetic recording simulation tool with a capability of representing realistic grain size distributions, temperature-dependent magnetic properties, and spatially-varying imposed temperature distributions was employed to study the interplay of thermal and magnetic field gradients in the recording process. In addition, a simple LLG-based thermomagnetic switching model supplemented the micromagnetics model. We fabricated improved Co/X multilayer media for recording evaluation, and performed standard materials characterization., Pub. in Materials Research Society symposium proceedings; v. 674 pV2.3.1-V2.3.12, 2001. This article is from ADA402512 Applications of Ferromagnetic and Optical Materials, Storage and Magnetoelectronics: Symposia Held in San Francisco, California, U.S.A. on April 16-20, 2001