Low power and high speed bipolar switching with a thin reactive Ti buffer layer in robust HfO2 based RRAM

A novel HfO₂-based resistive memory with the TiN electrodes is proposed and fully integrated with 0.18 mum CMOS technology. By using a thin Ti layer as the reactive buffer layer into the anodic side of capacitor-like memory cell, excellent memory performances, such as low operation current (down to 25 muA), high on/off resistance ratio (above 1,000), fast switching speed (5 ns), satisfactory switching endurance (>10⁶ cycles), and reliable data retention (10 years extrapolation at 200degC) have been demonstrated in our memory device. Moreover, the benefits of high yield, robust memory performance at high temperature (200degC), excellent scalability, and multi-level operation promise its application in the next generation nonvolatile memory.