Alternate method of TDDB study for aluminum oxide using magneto-resistance

Author

Kumar, Santosh ; Knowlton, William B.

Author_Institution

Cypress Semicond., San Jose, CA, USA

fYear

2002

fDate

21-24 Oct. 2002

Firstpage

180

Lastpage

183

Abstract

A sensitive and accurate method/test to predict the lifetime of aluminum oxide used as a tunnel barrier in magnetic random access memory (MRAM) has been devised. The performance of magnetic tunnel junction is dependent upon the lifetime of aluminum oxide. Aluminum oxide has also been used in high dielectric constant gate dielectric MOS devices suitable for high speed applications. This method relies upon the measurement of anti parallel and parallel resistance of the magnetic stack in a tunnel magneto resistor using aluminum oxide as a tunnel barrier. This is a more sensitive method than the conventional methods.

Keywords

aluminium compounds; dielectric measurement; electric breakdown; life testing; magnetic storage; magnetic tunnelling; magnetoresistance; random-access storage; Al₂O₃; aluminum oxide; high-k gate dielectric; high-speed MOS device; lifetime testing; magnetic random access memory; magnetic tunnel junction; magnetoresistance; time-dependent dielectric breakdown; tunnel barrier; tunnel magnetoresistor; Aluminum oxide; Dielectric constant; Dielectric devices; Dielectric measurements; Electrical resistance measurement; High-K gate dielectrics; Life testing; MOS devices; Magnetic tunneling; Random access memory;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Integrated Reliability Workshop Final Report, 2002. IEEE International

Print_ISBN

0-7803-7558-0

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IRWS.2002.1194263

Filename

1194263