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Review Article

The "gene" of reversible phase transformation of phase change materials: Octahedral motif

Zhitang Song1,2( ), Ruobing Wang1,2, Yuan Xue1,2, Sannian Song1,2
State Key Laboratory of Functional Materials for Informatics, Shanghai Institute of Micro-System and Information TechnologyChinese Academy of SciencesShanghai200050China
Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics EngineeringUniversity of Chinese Academy of SciencesBeijing100049China
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Abstract

Nonvolatile phase change random access memory (PCRAM) is regarded as one of promising candidates for next-generation memory in the era of Big Data. The phase transition mechanism of phase change materials is the key scientific issue to be addressed for phase change memory. Moreover, obtaining homogeneous phase change materials with high speed, low power consumption, long life and good thermal stability is still the ultimate challenge for high-density three-dimensional (3D) PCRAM. In this paper, starting from the octahedral structure motifs (octahedrons) which are considered as the "gene" of phase change materials, a new view on the phase transition mechanism is proposed. Based on this mechanism, a homogeneous phase change material is developed by constructing three matched octahedrons, which achieved an overall improvement in performance, showing 180 ℃ ten-year data retention, 6 ns SET speed, one order of magnitude longer life time and 75% reduced power consumption compared with traditional Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST) devices. It is of great significance to use it in 3D PCRAM chip and multi-level brain- inspired computing chip in the future.

Keywords

phase change memoryphase transition mechanismoctahedral atomic motifsmatchinghigh density

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Nano Research
Volume 15 Issue 2,
February 2022
Pages 765-772
DOI: 10.1007/s12274-021-3570-1
Cite this article:
Song Z, Wang R, Xue Y, et al. The "gene" of reversible phase transformation of phase change materials: Octahedral motif. Nano Research, 2022, 15(2): 765-772. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-021-3570-1
Topics:
Semiconductor devices

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Received: 15 March 2021
Revised: 29 April 2021
Accepted: 03 May 2021
Published: 28 June 2021
© Tsinghua University Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2021
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