Abstract:
Moore’s Law has fueled semiconductor industry growth for decades, but the challenges for maintaining an economically manageable pace to increase performance is now a rising issue. On the one hand, demand for IC chips with more power efficient computing and higher functions remain unchanged. However, this exacerbates the long-standing inefficiencies between processor and memory that represents a road block which needs be addressed. New memory, called storage class memory, which is characterized as offering the combination of DRAM and NAND for fast data access and data retention respectively, is being considered to dramatically improve overall system performance. Currently, there are several different candidates based upon different operation mechanisms that show the potential to meet this need, such as Phase Change RAM (PCRAM), Spin-Transfer Torque Magnetic RAM (STT-MRAM), Resistive Random-Access Memory (ReRAM: OxRAM and CBRAM). For these devices to be successful in high-volume manufacturing, processing new materials such as chalcogenide materials, noble metals and sub-stoichiometric transition metal oxides are critical to achieve good control of alloy composition, magnetization, oxygen vacancy and metal ion drift. These controls are further challenged in various 3D structures with extremely high aspect ratios that need novel etching solutions to enable the device for low cost structure.