Low-Temperature Processing of Ferroelectric Thin Films Compatible with Silicon Integrated Circuit Technology

摘要

The microelectronics industry is based on silicon as a material which, after a controlled reaction with oxygen, forms a SiO_2 insulator. This dielectric is used in silicon semiconductor technology for information storage in dynamic random access memories (DRAMs) or as a transistor gate dielectric in logic devices. Much progress has been made on this technology over the last three decades, due to the scaling down of semiconductor devices. This has resulted in an increase in the number of components in integrated circuits, in a better performance of the device, and in a decrease in its fabrication cost. However, the miniaturization of silicon devices is predicted by the semiconductor industry roadmap to reach atomic dimensions by 2012, when SiO_2 will reach its fundamental physical limit.