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An Introduction on Phase-Change Memories

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Phase Change Memory

Abstract

The phase-change memory (PCM), also called ovonic unified memory (OUM) or phase-change RAM (PCRAM), is an emerging nonvolatile semiconductor technology based on thermally induced phase transitions of a thin-film chalcogenide material. PCM relies on a resistance change to store data permanently. However, the historical origin of the PCM concept that dates back in the 1970s and the research efforts specifically devoted to this technology by semiconductor industries set them apart from the larger class of emerging memory technologies based on resistance variation and usually referred to as resistive RAM (ReRAM).

The PCM device is essentially a resistor of a thin-film chalcogenide material, usually a Ge–Sb–Te alloy with a low-field resistance that changes by orders of magnitudes, depending on the phase state of the material in the active region (i.e., crystalline or amorphous). In memory operation, cell readout is performed at low bias by sensing the resistance value. Programming requires instead a relatively large current, in order to heat up the chalcogenide material and lead to a thermally induced local phase change. Phase transitions can thus be easily obtained by applying voltage pulses with different amplitudes and with durations in the range of tenths of nanoseconds.

Such technology is one of the most promising candidates for next-generation nonvolatile memories (NVM) having the potentiality to improve the performance compared to flash – random access time and read throughput (versus NOR flash), write throughput (versus NAND flash), direct write, bit granularity, and endurance – as well as to be scalable beyond flash technology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Micron, Vimercate, Italy

    Agostino Pirovano

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  1. Agostino Pirovano
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Correspondence to Agostino Pirovano .

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  1. Micron Semiconductor Italia S.r.l., Vimercate, Italy

    Andrea Redaelli

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Pirovano, A. (2018). An Introduction on Phase-Change Memories. In: Redaelli, A. (eds) Phase Change Memory. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69053-7_1

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