Effect of downsizing and metallization on switching performance of ultrathin hafnium oxide memory cells

This paper explores the suitability of atomic layer deposited hafnium oxide (HfO2) based resistive oxide mem-ories for their integration into advanced embedded non-volatile memory technology nodes at 28 nm and below. Downscaling trends in advanced CMOS semiconductor technology and novel user needs require high packing density, lower power consumption, faster read-write with enhanced reliability features. Two terminal resistive memory layers, which were produced under optimized atomic layer deposition conditions have been investi-gated in terms of these features in addition of downscaling and cost-effective production. The experimental results are focused on downscaling issue of HfO2 based oxide RAMs with an emphasis on structure and electrode metallization dependent resistive switching of Metal/HfO2/Metal memory stacks and associated physical and electrical characteristics. The role of the metallization, microstructure and dielectric properties were determined to have better insight into the switching performance. Finally, a memory cell array test platform was set up using a 4k 1T1R cell array architecture and its suitability was demonstrated for testing the performance of resistive memory cells for advanced technology nodes.