An Improved Model for Calculating Tunneling Current in Nanocrystal Memory

Author

Pavel, Akeed A. ; Sharma, Ashwani ; Islam, Naz

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Missouri Univ., Columbia, MO

Volume

29

Issue

12

fYear

2008

Firstpage

1370

Lastpage

1372

Abstract

A methodology to compute tunneling currents in a nanocrystal (NC) memory cell is presented to reveal the positive impact of using metal NCs as storage nodes. An analytical model for quantifying the NC effect on electrostatic potential has been used with a transmission line analogy-based quantum mechanical method to calculate the tunneling current. The model includes the effects of the electron wave function penetration into the gate dielectric and also shows the influence of NCs´ spacing and material properties on the programming characteristic of the memory cell. Results can be used in optimizing the structure for maximum programming efficiency.

Keywords

nanostructured materials; transmission lines; electron wave function penetration; electrostatic potentials; maximum programming; nanocrystal memory cell; transmission line analogy-based quantum mechanical method; tunneling current; Analytical models; Dielectrics; Electrons; Electrostatics; Material properties; Nanocrystals; Quantum mechanics; Transmission lines; Tunneling; Wave functions; Nanocrystal (NC) memory; tunneling;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LED.2008.2006633

Filename

4671139