Impact of compliance current overshoot on high resistance state, memory performance, and device yield of HfOx based resistive memory and its solution

The evidence of degraded R_HIGH or permanent damage of the device induced by the current overshoot in the forming/SET step is demonstrated and a possible scenario for this result is revealed. Dependence of the overshooting current on the cathodic electrode and device configuration are discussed. Reduction of the overshooting current by a transistor can enhance the memory performances. The devices with high Rιιιgii (>; 1 MOhm) and endurance (>; 100M cycles) are achieved. With an exterior resistor, the HfOχ/TaN device shows a robust repetitive switching.