Metal nanocrystal memories-part II: electrical characteristics

Author

Liu, Zengtao ; Lee, Chungho ; Narayanan, Venkat ; Pei, Gen ; Kan, Edwin Chihchuan

Author_Institution

Sch. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Cornell Univ., Ithaca, NY, USA

Volume

49

Issue

9

fYear

2002

fDate

9/1/2002 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

1614

Lastpage

1622

Abstract

This paper describes the electrical characteristics of the metal nanocrystal memory devices continued from the previous paper [see ibid., vol. 49, p. 1606-13, Sept. 2002]. Devices with Au, Ag, and Pt nanocrystals working in the F-N tunneling regime have been investigated and compared with Si nanocrystal memory devices. With hot-carrier injection such as the programming mechanism, retention time up to 10⁶ s has been observed and 2-bit-per-cell storage capability has been demonstrated and analyzed. The concern of the possible metal contamination is also addressed by current-voltage (I-V) and capacitance-voltage (C-V) characterizations. The extracted inversion layer mobility and minority carrier lifetime suggest that the substrate is free from metal contamination with continuous operations

Keywords

MOS memory circuits; MOSFET; carrier lifetime; characteristics measurement; hot carriers; integrated circuit measurement; inversion layers; minority carriers; nanotechnology; tunnelling; 10⁶ s; Ag; Au; F-N tunneling regime; MOSFETs; Pt; capacitance-voltage characterizations; current-voltage characterizations; electrical characteristics; hot-carrier injection; inversion layer mobility; metal contamination; metal nanocrystal memories; minority carrier lifetime; programming mechanism; retention time; storage capability; Capacitance; Charge carrier lifetime; Contamination; Electric variables; Gold; Hot carrier injection; MOSFETs; Nanocrystals; Thickness control; Tunneling;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Devices, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9383

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TED.2002.802618

Filename

1027845