Electric-field induced structural transition in vertical MoTe2- and Mo1-xWxTe2-based resistive memories

Feng Zhang; Huairuo Zhang; Sergiy Krylyuk; Cory A Milligan; Yuqi Zhu; Dmitry Y Zemlyanov; Leonid A Bendersky; Benjamin P Burton; Albert V Davydov; Joerg Appenzeller

doi:10.1038/s41563-018-0234-y

Electric-field induced structural transition in vertical MoTe₂- and Mo_1-xW_xTe₂-based resistive memories

Nat Mater. 2019 Jan;18(1):55-61. doi: 10.1038/s41563-018-0234-y. Epub 2018 Dec 10.

Authors

Feng Zhang^{1

2}, Huairuo Zhang^{3

4}, Sergiy Krylyuk^{5

6}, Cory A Milligan^{1

7}, Yuqi Zhu^{1

2}, Dmitry Y Zemlyanov¹, Leonid A Bendersky⁶, Benjamin P Burton⁶, Albert V Davydov⁶, Joerg Appenzeller^{8

9}

Affiliations

¹ Birck Nanotechnology Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA.
² Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA.
³ Theiss Research, Inc., La Jolla, CA, USA. huairuo.zhang@nist.gov.
⁴ Materials Science and Engineering Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD, USA. huairuo.zhang@nist.gov.
⁵ Theiss Research, Inc., La Jolla, CA, USA.
⁶ Materials Science and Engineering Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD, USA.
⁷ School of Chemical Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA.
⁸ Birck Nanotechnology Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA. appenzeller@purdue.edu.
⁹ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA. appenzeller@purdue.edu.

PMID: 30542093
DOI: 10.1038/s41563-018-0234-y

Abstract

Transition metal dichalcogenides have attracted attention as potential building blocks for various electronic applications due to their atomically thin nature and polymorphism. Here, we report an electric-field-induced structural transition from a 2H semiconducting to a distorted transient structure (2H_d) and orthorhombic T_d conducting phase in vertical 2H-MoTe₂- and Mo_1-xW_xTe₂-based resistive random access memory (RRAM) devices. RRAM programming voltages are tunable by the transition metal dichalcogenide thickness and show a distinctive trend of requiring lower electric fields for Mo_1-xW_xTe₂ alloys versus MoTe₂ compounds. Devices showed reproducible resistive switching within 10 ns between a high resistive state and a low resistive state. Moreover, using an Al₂O₃/MoTe₂ stack, On/off current ratios of 10⁶ with programming currents lower than 1 μA were achieved in a selectorless RRAM architecture. The sum of these findings demonstrates that controlled electrical state switching in two-dimensional materials is achievable and highlights the potential of transition metal dichalcogenides for memory applications.

Publication types

Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't