• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.19 no.9
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• pp.462-467
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• 2009

The Charge Trap Flash (CTF) memory device is a replacement candidate for the NAND Flash device. In this study, Pt/$Al_2O_3/La_2O_3/SiO_2$/Si multilayer structures with lanthanum oxide charge trap layers were fabricated for nonvolatile memory device applications. Aluminum oxide films were used as blocking oxides for low power consumption in program/erase operations and reduced charge transports through blocking oxide layers. The thicknesses of $SiO_2$ were from 30 $\AA$ to 50 $\AA$. From the C-V measurement, the largest memory window of 1.3V was obtained in the 40 $\AA$ tunnel oxide specimen, and the 50 $\AA$ tunnel oxide specimen showed the smallest memory window. In the cycling test for reliability, the 30 $\AA$ tunnel oxide sample showed an abrupt memory window reduction due to a high electric field of 9$\sim$10MV/cm through the tunnel oxide while the other samples showed less than a 10% loss of memory window for $10^4$ cycles of program/erase operation. The I-V measurement data of the capacitor structures indicated leakage current values in the order of $10^{-4}A/cm^2$ at 1V. These values are small enough to be used in nonvolatile memory devices, and the sample with tunnel oxide formed at $850^{\circ}C$ showed superior memory characteristics compared to the sample with $750^{\circ}C$ tunnel oxide due to higher concentration of trap sites at the interface region originating from the rough interface.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics and Information Engineers
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• v.49 no.9
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• pp.251-258
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• 2012

Recently, NAND Flash memory structure is evolving from SDR (Single Data Rate) to high speed DDR(Double Data Rate) to fulfill the high performance requirement of SSD and SSS. Accordingly, the proper ways of transferring data that latches valid data stably and minimizing data skew between pins by using PHY(Physical layer) circuit techniques have became new issues. Also, rapid growth of speed in NAND flash increases the operating frequency and power consumption of NAND flash controller. Internal voltage variation margin of NAND flash controller will be narrowed through the smaller geometry and lower internal operating voltage below 1.5V. Therefore, the increase of power budge deviation limits the normal operation range of internal circuit. Affection of OCV(On Chip Variation) deteriorates the voltage variation problem and thus causes internal logic errors. In this case, it is too hard to debug, because it is not functional faults. In this paper, we propose new architecture that maintains the valid timing window in cost effective way under sudden power fluctuation cases. Simulation results show that the proposed technique minimizes the data skew by 379% with reduced area by 20% compared to using PHY circuits.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.7-11
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• 2017

In this paper, we have studied the characteristics of NAND Flash memory in SONOS Poly-Si Thin Film Transistor (Poly-Si TFT) device. Source/drain junctions(S/D) of cells were not implanted and selective transistors were located in the end of cells. We found the optimum conditions of process by means of the estimation for the doping concentration of channel and source/drain of selective transistor. As the doping concentration was increased, the channel current was increased and the characteristic of erase was improved. It was believed that the improvement of erase characteristic was probably due to the higher channel potential induced by GIDL current at the abrupt junction. In the condition of process optimum, program windows of threshold voltages were about 2.5V after writing and erasing. In addition, it was obtained that the swing value of poly Si TFT and the reliability by bake were enhanced by increasing process temperature of tunnel oxide.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.461-466
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• 2010

In this study, $Al_2O_3/TaAlO_4/SiO_2$ (A/TAlO/S) structures with tantalum aluminate charge trap layer were fabricated for Nand flash memory device. We evaluated the memory window and retention characteristic as the thickness of the tunnel oxide was varied among 3 nm, 4 nm, and 5 nm. All tunnel oxide thicknesses were measured by ellipsometer and TEM (Transmission Electron Microscope). The A/TAlO/S multi-layer film consisted of 5 nm tunnel oxide showed the best result of memory window of 1.57 V and retention characteristics. After annealing the 5 nm tunnel oxide A/TAlO/S multi-layer film at $900^{\circ}C$. The memory window decreased to 1.32 V. Moreover, the TEM images confirmed that the thickness of multi-layer structure decreased 14.3% after annealing and the program conditions of A/TAlO/S multi-layer film decreased from 13 V to 11 V for 100 ms. Retention properties of both as-deposited and annealed films stably maintained until to $10^4$ cycles.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.122-122
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• 2008

Recently, Metal/Alumina/Silicon-Nitride/Silicon-Oxide/Silicon (MANOS) structures are one of the most attractive candidates to realize vertical scaling of high-density NAND flash memory [1]. However, as ANO layers are miniaturized, negative and positive bias temperature instability (NBTI/PBTI), such as the flat band voltage shift, ${\Delta}V_{FB}$, the interfacial trap density increase, ${\Delta}D_{it}$, the gate leakage current, ${\Delta}I_G$. and the retention characteristics, in MONOS capacitors, becomes an important issue in terms of reliability. It is well known that tunnel oxide degradation is a result of the oxide and interfacial traps generation during FN (Fowler-Nordheim) stress [2]. Because the bias temperature stress causes an increase of both interfacial-traps and fixed oxide charge could be a factor, witch can degrade device reliability during the program and erase operation. However, few studies on NBTI/PBTI have been conducted on improving the reliability of MONOS devices. In this work, we investigate the effect of post-annealing gas on bias temperature instability (BTI), such as the flat band voltage shift, ${\Delta}V_{FB}$, the interfacial trap density shift, ${\Delta}I_G$ retention characteristics, and the gate leakage current characteristics of MANOS capacitors. MANOS samples annealed at $950^{\circ}C$ for 30 s by a rapid thermal process were treated via additional annealing in a furnace, using annealing gases $N_2$ and $N_2-H_2$ (2 % hydrogen and 98 % nitrogen mixture gases) at $450^{\circ}C$ for 30 min. MANOS samples annealed in $N_2-H_2$ ambient had the lowest flat band voltage shift, ${\Delta}V_{FB}$ = 1.09/0.63 V at the program/erase state, and the good retention characteristics, 123/84 mV/decade at the program/erase state more than the sample annealed at $N_2$ ambient.