Scientists Grow a Material Based on Hafnium Oxide for a New Type of Non-volatile Memory
April 15, 2016 | MIPTEstimated reading time: 4 minutes
Fig. 2 Cross section of the structure developed: a polycrystalline alloyed film of hafnium - zirconium oxides grown directly on a highly doped Si substrate (upper electrode – titanium nitride). Image courtesy of the authors of the study.
While hafnium oxide is already used in the production of modern silicon logic chips, a few years ago ferroelectric properties were discovered in one of its modifications. In their study, the scientists from MIPT succeeded in growing an ultra-thin, tunnel-transparent film of this material on a silicon substrate, while maintaining the ferroelectric properties.
It is important to note that the the film was grown by Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) technique. which is widely used today in the production of modern microprocessors and one of its particular benefits is that it enables functional layers to be grown in three-dimensional structures.
“Since the structures of this material are compatible with silicon technology, we can expect that new non-volatile memory devices with ferroelectric polycrystalline layers of hafnium oxide will be able to be built directly onto silicon in the near future,” says the corresponding author of the study and head of the Laboratory of Functional Materials and Devices for Nanoelectronics, Andrei Zenkevich.
Furthermore, if ferroelectric tunnel junctions based on hafnium oxide are developed, it can be hoped that they will be able to demonstrate memristor properties. This is a prerequisite for creating electronic synapses, which could be used in neuromorphic systems that are currently being developed. These systems have a fundamentally different computing architecture that simulates the functioning principles of the human brain.
The study was supported by Grant No.14-16-01698 of the Russian Science Foundation and the MIPT Project 5-100 programme. Technological and analytical equipment from MIPT’s Centre for the Collective Use of Unique Scientific Equipment in the Field of Nanotechnology was used during the study.
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