Embedding of Nanocrystalline Ruthenium Oxide in Zirconium-doped Hafnium Oxide High-k Film for Nonvolatile Memories

摘要

MOS nonvolatile memory capacitors made of the nanocrystalline RuO_x embedded Zr-doped HfO_2 high-k gate dielectric film were fabricated and characterized. The as-deposited Ru film changed into discrete nanocrystalline RuO_x with a sheet density of 8×10~(11)cm~(-2) after the 950℃ thermal annealing. The Coulomb blockade effect was observed. The device showed a large memory window, i.e., 1.72V in the gate sweep range of ±9V. The memory function was mainly contributed by the hole trapping mechanism, especially below the ±6V gate bias region.