Metal Nanocrystal Memory With Pt Single- and Dual-Layer NC With Low-Leakage $\hbox {Al}_{2}\hbox {O}_{3}$ Blocking Dielectric

In this letter, we report metal nanocrystal (NC)-based flash memory devices with single-layer (SL) and dual-layer (DL) Pt NCs as the storage element. The devices are fabricated using CMOS compatible process flow with optimized low-leakage high-k Al₂O₃ as the control dielectric. Large memory window (10 V for SL and 15 V for DL devices) is observed due to overerase, which increases the overall window. Improvement in DL memory window is found to be due to 1.5 times improvement in total stored charge over SL. Excellent high-temperature precycling retention is observed both for SL and DL devices.