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Tasneem N, Kashyap H, Chae K, Park C, Lee PC, Lombardo SF, Afroze N, Tian M, Kumarasubramanian H, Hur J, Chen H, Chern W, Yu S, Bandaru P, Ravichandran J, Cho K, Kacher J, Kummel AC, Khan AI. Remote Oxygen Scavenging of the Interfacial Oxide Layer in Ferroelectric Hafnium-Zirconium Oxide-Based Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Structures. ACS APPLIED MATERIALS & INTERFACES 2022; 14:43897-43906. [PMID: 36121320 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.2c11736] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
Discovery of ferroelectricity in HfO2 has sparked a lot of interest in its use in memory and logic due to its CMOS compatibility and scalability. Devices that use ferroelectric HfO2 are being investigated; for example, the ferroelectric field-effect transistor (FEFET) is one of the leading candidates for next generation memory technology, due to its area, energy efficiency and fast operation. In an FEFET, a ferroelectric layer is deposited on Si, with an SiO2 layer of ∼1 nm thickness inevitably forming at the interface. This interfacial layer (IL) increases the gate voltage required to switch the polarization and write into the memory device, thereby increasing the energy required to operate FEFETs, and makes the technology incompatible with logic circuits. In this work, it is shown that a Pt/Ti/thin TiN gate electrode in a ferroelectric Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 based metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) structure can remotely scavenge oxygen from the IL, thinning it down to ∼0.5 nm. This IL reduction significantly reduces the ferroelectric polarization switching voltage with a ∼2× concomitant increase in the remnant polarization and a ∼3× increase in the abruptness of polarization switching consistent with density functional theory (DFT) calculations modeling the role of the IL layer in the gate stack electrostatics. The large increase in remnant polarization and abruptness of polarization switching are consistent with the oxygen diffusion in the scavenging process reducing oxygen vacancies in the HZO layer, thereby depinning the polarization of some of the HZO grains.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nujhat Tasneem
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Harshil Kashyap
- Department of Chemistry and BioChemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
| | - Kisung Chae
- Department of Chemistry and BioChemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas 75080, United States
| | - Chinsung Park
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Ping-Che Lee
- Department of Chemistry and BioChemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
| | - Sarah F Lombardo
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Nashrah Afroze
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Mengkun Tian
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Harish Kumarasubramanian
- Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
| | - Jae Hur
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Hang Chen
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Winston Chern
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Shimeng Yu
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Prabhakar Bandaru
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
| | - Jayakanth Ravichandran
- Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
- Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles 90089, United States
| | - Kyeongjae Cho
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas 75080, United States
| | - Josh Kacher
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Andrew C Kummel
- Department of Chemistry and BioChemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
| | - Asif Islam Khan
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
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Chae K, Lombardo SF, Tasneem N, Tian M, Kumarasubramanian H, Hur J, Chern W, Yu S, Richter C, Lomenzo PD, Hoffmann M, Schroeder U, Triyoso D, Consiglio S, Tapily K, Clark R, Leusink G, Bassiri-Gharb N, Bandaru P, Ravichandran J, Kummel A, Cho K, Kacher J, Khan AI. Local Epitaxial Templating Effects in Ferroelectric and Antiferroelectric ZrO 2. ACS APPLIED MATERIALS & INTERFACES 2022; 14:36771-36780. [PMID: 35929399 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.2c03151] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
Nanoscale polycrystalline thin-film heterostructures are central to microelectronics, for example, metals used as interconnects and high-K oxides used in dynamic random-access memories (DRAMs). The polycrystalline microstructure and overall functional response therein are often dominated by the underlying substrate or layer, which, however, is poorly understood due to the difficulty of characterizing microstructural correlations at a statistically meaningful scale. Here, an automated, high-throughput method, based on the nanobeam electron diffraction technique, is introduced to investigate orientational relations and correlations between crystallinity of materials in polycrystalline heterostructures over a length scale of microns, containing several hundred individual grains. This technique is employed to perform an atomic-scale investigation of the prevalent near-coincident site epitaxy in nanocrystalline ZrO2 heterostructures, the workhorse system in DRAM technology. The power of this analysis is demonstrated by answering a puzzling question: why does polycrystalline ZrO2 transform dramatically from being antiferroelectric on polycrystalline TiN/Si to ferroelectric on amorphous SiO2/Si?
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Affiliation(s)
- Kisung Chae
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas 75080, United States
| | - Sarah F Lombardo
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Nujhat Tasneem
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Mengkun Tian
- Institute of Electronics and Nanotechnology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30318, United States
| | - Harish Kumarasubramanian
- Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
- Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
| | - Jae Hur
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Winston Chern
- Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States
| | - Shimeng Yu
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Claudia Richter
- NaMLab gGmbH/TU Dresden, Noethnitzer Str. 64 a, Dresden D-01187, Germany
| | - Patrick D Lomenzo
- NaMLab gGmbH/TU Dresden, Noethnitzer Str. 64 a, Dresden D-01187, Germany
| | - Michael Hoffmann
- NaMLab gGmbH/TU Dresden, Noethnitzer Str. 64 a, Dresden D-01187, Germany
| | - Uwe Schroeder
- NaMLab gGmbH/TU Dresden, Noethnitzer Str. 64 a, Dresden D-01187, Germany
| | - Dina Triyoso
- TEL Technology Center, America, LLC, Albany, New York 12203, United States
| | - Steven Consiglio
- TEL Technology Center, America, LLC, Albany, New York 12203, United States
| | - Kanda Tapily
- TEL Technology Center, America, LLC, Albany, New York 12203, United States
| | - Robert Clark
- TEL Technology Center, America, LLC, Albany, New York 12203, United States
| | - Gert Leusink
- TEL Technology Center, America, LLC, Albany, New York 12203, United States
| | - Nazanin Bassiri-Gharb
- G.W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Prab Bandaru
- Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, University of California, La Jolla, San Diego, California 92093, United States
| | - Jayakanth Ravichandran
- Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
- Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States
| | - Andrew Kummel
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States
| | - Kyeongjae Cho
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas 75080, United States
| | - Josh Kacher
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
| | - Asif Islam Khan
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
- School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States
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