Suppressing Structural Relaxation in Nanoscale Antimony to Enable Ultralow‐Drift Phase‐Change Memory Applications

• DOI: 10.1002/advs.202301043
• Publication Date: 2023-06-28T09:49:35Z
• Authors: Bin Chen; Xue‐Peng Wang; Fangying Jiao; Long Ning; Jiaen Huang; Jiatao Xie; Shengbai Zhang; Xian‐Bin Li; Feng Rao
• Keywords: Phase-change memory; Distortion (music); Non-Volatile Memory

Abstract Phase‐change random‐access memory (PCRAM) devices suffer from pronounced resistance drift originating considerable structural relaxation of phase‐change materials (PCMs), which hinders current developments high‐capacity and high‐parallelism computing that both need reliable multibit programming. This work realizes compositional simplification geometrical miniaturization traditional GeSbTe‐like PCMs are feasible routes to suppress relaxation. While date, the aging mechanisms simplest PCM, Sb, at nanoscale, have not yet been unveiled. Here, this demonstrates in an optimal thickness only 4 nm, thin Sb film can enable a precise multilevel programming with ultralow coefficients, regime ≈10 −4 –10 −3 . advancement is mainly owed slightly changed Peierls distortion less‐distorted octahedral‐like atomic configurations across Sb/SiO 2 interfaces. highlights new indispensable approach, interfacial regulation nanoscale PCMs, for pursuing ultimately control aggressively‐miniaturized PCRAM devices, boost storage efficiencies substantially.