Tantalum-Nitride Antifuse Electromechanical OTP for Embedded Memory Applications

Author

Singh, Prashant ; Chua Geng Li ; Pitchappa, Prakash ; Chengkuo Lee

Author_Institution

Inst. of Microelectron., Agency for Sci., Singapore, Singapore

Volume

34

Issue

8

fYear

2013

fDate

Aug. 2013

Firstpage

987

Lastpage

989

Abstract

Embedded nonvolatile memory (NVM) integrated in the back-end of line processes are of high interest, particularly for rugged environments (high temperature/radiation or vibration). This letter demonstrates the use of tantalum nitride microbeams as antifuse one-time programmable (OTP) NVM. It needs a single mask process and can be integrated above an integrated circuit. Typical fusing current is 1 mA, operating voltage is 4 V, and the measured contact resistance is <;2 kQ. A hybrid one-transistor/one microbeam/bit memory array is proposed for back-end compatible and low-cost OTP NVM integration.

Keywords

embedded systems; integrated memory circuits; random-access storage; tantalum compounds; TaN; antifuse electromechanical OTP; antifuse one-time programmable NVM; back-end of line processes; current 1 mA; embedded nonvolatile memory; hybrid one-transistor/one microbeam/bit memory array; integrated circuit; microbeams; voltage 4 V; Embedded memory; nanoelectro-mechanical systems (NEMS); nonvolatile memory (NVM); one-time programmable (OTP); tantalum nitride (TaN);

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LED.2013.2262918

Filename

6544267