Improving interfacial and electrical properties of HfO_(2)/SiO_(2)/p-Si stacks with N_(2)-plasma-treated SiO_(2) interfacial layer

The effect of N_(2)-plasma-treated SiO_(2) interfacial layer on the interfacial and electrical characteristics of HfO_(2)/SiO_(2)/p-Si stacks grown by atomic layer deposition(ALD) was investigated.The microstructure and interfacial chemical bonding configuration of the HfO_(2)/SiO_(2)/Si stacks were also examined by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy(HRTEM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy(XPS).Compared with the samples without N2-plasma treatment,it is found that the samples with N2-plasma treatment have less oxygen vacancy density for SiO_(2) interfacial layer and better HfO_(2)/SiO_(2) interface.In agreement with XPS analyses,electrical measurements of the samples with N2-plasma treatment show better interfacial quality,including lower interface-state density(Dit,9.3 × 1011 cm^(-2)·eV^(-1) near midgap) and lower oxidecharge density(Q_(ox),2.5 × 1012 cm^(-2)),than those of the samples without N_(2)-plasma treatment.Additionally,the samples with N_(2)-plasma treatment have better electrical performances,including higher saturation capacitance density(1.49 μF·cm^(-2)) and lower leakage current density(3.2 × 10^(-6) A·cm^(-2) at V_(g)=V_(fb)-1 V).Furthermore,constant voltage stress was applied on the gate electrode to investigate the reliability of these samples.It shows that the samples with N_(2)-plasma treatment have better electrical stability than the samples without N_(2)-plasma treatment.

Resistive switching characteristics of Dy_2O_3 film with a Pt nanocrystal embedding layer formed by pulsed laser deposition

Resistive switching （RS） behaviors of Dy2O3- based memory devices with and without Pt nanocrystals （Pt-nc） layer were investigated for nonvolatile memory applications. The Cu/Pt-nc/Dy2O3/Pt memory exhibits excellent unipolar RS characteristics, including highly uniform switching parameters, lower switching voltage （〈1.2 V）, high resistance ratio （〉1 × 104）, a large number of switching cycles, as well as long retention time （〉1 × 105 s）, owing to the local electric field confined and strengthened near the nanocrystals＇ location.

Energy band alignment of HfO2 on p-type(100)InP

The band alignment of HfO2 film on p-type （100） InP substrate grown by magnetron sputtering was investigated.The chemical states and bonding characteristics of the system were characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy （XPS）.The results show that there is no existence of Hf-P or Hf-In and there are interfacial In2O3 and InPO4 at the interface.Ultraviolet spectrophotometer （UVS） was employed to obtain the band gap value of HfO2.In 3d and Hf 4f core-level spectra and valence spectra were employed to obtain the valence band offset of HfO2/InP.Experimental results show that the （5.88 ± 0.05） eV band gap of HfO2 is aligned to the band gap of InP with a conduction band offset （△Ec） of （2.74 ± 0.05） eV and a valence band offset （△Ev） of （1.80 ± 0.05） eV.Compared with HfO2 on Si,HfO2 on InP exhibits a much larger conduction band offset （1.35 eV larger）,which is beneficial to suppress the tunneling leakage current.