Magnetic recording in hard disk is already a genuine example of nanotechnology 'on your desk', storing information on magnetic nanoparticles of only a few hundred thousand spins.

Following the discovery of the giant magnetoresistance in 1988, the experimental realisation of the magnetic tunnel junction in 1995 provided the first practical device to link magnetism to electronics, bringing to ultrahigh density electronics the potential for speed, non volatility and radiation hardness of magnetic recording.

This was the starting point for 'Spin Electronics', a new paradigm for electronics that now encompasses research in many areas from half metals and magnetic semiconductors to molecules, with promising applications to random access memories (RAM), integrable RF sources, ultrahigh sensitivity sensors for MEMS and Bio-chips, optoelectronic devices, etc. After surveying the recent advances of Spin Electronics, I will discuss its main orientations and the major challenges that remain to be overcome.

Claude Chappert received his 'Docteur d'Etat' Diploma in 1985 from Université Paris Sud, after graduating from the "Ecole Normale Supérieure de Saint Cloud". He is now Research Director at CNRS, with over 25 years experience in research on magnetic ultrathin films and nanostructures, and their applications to ultrahigh density recording, for which he was awarded the Silver Medal of CNRS in 2000. He currently leads a research group on "Nanospintronics" within Institut d'Electronique Fondamentale at University Paris Sud-Orsay, and is in charge of the "Spin Electronics" division of the Centre de Competence Nanosciences Ile-de-France.