• Title/Summary/Keyword: tunnel barrier engineering

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Etch Characteristics of MgO Thin Films in Cl2/Ar, CH3OH/Ar, and CH4/Ar Plasmas

  • Lee, Il Hoon;Lee, Tea Young;Chung, Chee Won
    • Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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    • 2013.02a
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    • pp.387-387
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    • 2013
  • Currently, the flash memory and the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) have been used in a variety of applications. However, the downsizing of devices and the increasing density of recording medias are now in progress. So there are many demands for development of new semiconductor memory for next generation. Magnetic random access memory (MRAM) is one of the prospective semiconductor memories with excellent features including non-volatility, fast access time, unlimited read/write endurance, low operating voltage, and high storage density. MRAM is composed of magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) stack and complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS). The MTJ stack consists of various magnetic materials, metals, and a tunneling barrier layer. Recently, MgO thin films have attracted a great attention as the prominent candidates for a tunneling barrier layer in the MTJ stack instead of the conventional Al2O3 films, because it has low Gibbs energy, low dielectric constant and high tunneling magnetoresistance value. For the successful etching of high density MRAM, the etching characteristics of MgO thin films as a tunneling barrier layer should be developed. In this study, the etch characteristics of MgO thin films have been investigated in various gas mixes using an inductively coupled plasma reactive ion etching (ICPRIE). The Cl2/Ar, CH3OH/Ar, and CH4/Ar gas mix were employed to find an optimized etching gas for MgO thin film etching. TiN thin films were employed as a hard mask to increase the etch selectivity. The etch rates were obtained using surface profilometer and etch profiles were observed by using the field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM).

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A Study on the Natural Ventilation Force in Tunnels (터널형 지하공간내의 자연환기력 분석)

  • Lee, Chang-Woo;Park, Hong-Chae
    • Tunnel and Underground Space
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    • v.19 no.3
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    • pp.226-235
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    • 2009
  • Force induced by the natural ventilation in tunnel is likely to generate adverse influences on the airflow during the normal operation and create even more unfavorable circumstances during the tunnel fire. The influence of the natural ventilation is required to take into account in designing and operating the ventilation as well as safety systems. The magnitude of natural ventilation force depends on a variety of factors associated with the topographical, meteorological and physical features of tunnel. Unfortunately, at this moment those are difficult to quantify and none of the countries has suggested its estimation method in the design guideline. This study aims at quantifying the natural ventilation force at a local highway tunnel by three different methods. The first method employes direct measurement of the pressure at portals, while the second applies a stepwise approach to eliminate the piston effect ahead of deriving the natural ventilation force and the third method uses the concept of barometric barrier.

Evaluation of Pressure Effects on Blast Valves for Facility Protection of Underground Computing Center (지하 전산센터의 시설보호를 위한 방폭밸브에 미치는 폭압 평가)

  • Pang, Seung-Ki;Shin, Jin-Won;Kim, Wae-deuk
    • Journal of the Korean Society for Geothermal and Hydrothermal Energy
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    • v.14 no.3
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    • pp.21-28
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    • 2018
  • This paper presents two-step simulations to calculate the influence of blast-induced pressures on explosion-protection valves installed at the boundary between a protection facility and a tunnel entering the facility. The first step is to calculate the respective overpressure on the entrance and exit of the tunnel when an explosion occurs near the tunnel entrance and exit to approach the protection facility. Secondly, the blast pressures on the explosion-protection valves mounted to walls located near the tunnel inside approaching the protection facility are analyzed with a 0.1 ms time variation using the results obtained from the first-step calculations. The following conclusions could be derived as a results: (1) The analysis of the entrance tunnel scenario, P1, leads to the maximum overpressure of 47 kPa, approximately a half of the ambient pressure, at the inner entrance due to the effect of blast barrier. For the scenario, P2, the case not blocked by the barrier, the maximum overpressure is 628 kPa, which is relatively high, namely, 5.2 times the ambient pressure. (2) It is observed that the pressure for the entrance tunnel is effectively mitigated because the initial blast pressures are partially offset from each other according to the geometry of the entrance and a portion of the pressures is discharged to the outside.

Fabrication and characterization of $WSi_2$ nanocrystals memory device with $SiO_2$ / $HfO_2$ / $Al_2O_3$ tunnel layer

  • Lee, Hyo-Jun;Lee, Dong-Uk;Kim, Eun-Kyu;Son, Jung-Woo;Cho, Won-Ju
    • Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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    • 2011.02a
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    • pp.134-134
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    • 2011
  • High-k dielectric materials such as $HfO_2$, $ZrO_2$ and $Al_2O_3$ increase gate capacitance and reduce gate leakage current in MOSFET structures. This behavior suggests that high-k materials will be promise candidates to substitute as a tunnel barrier. Furthermore, stack structure of low-k and high-k tunnel barrier named variable oxide thickness (VARIOT) is more efficient.[1] In this study, we fabricated the $WSi_2$ nanocrystals nonvolatile memory device with $SiO_2/HfO_2/Al_2O_3$ tunnel layer. The $WSi_2$ nano-floating gate capacitors were fabricated on p-type Si (100) wafers. After wafer cleaning, the phosphorus in-situ doped poly-Si layer with a thickness of 100 nm was deposited on isolated active region to confine source and drain. Then, on the gate region defined by using reactive ion etching, the barrier engineered multi-stack tunnel layers of $SiO_2/HfO_2/Al_2O_3$ (2 nm/1 nm/3 nm) were deposited the gate region on Si substrate by using atomic layer deposition. To fabricate $WSi_2$ nanocrystals, the ultrathin $WSi_2$ film with a thickness of 3-4 nm was deposited on the multi-stack tunnel layer by using direct current magnetron sputtering system [2]. Subsequently, the first post annealing process was carried out at $900^{\circ}C$ for 1 min by using rapid thermal annealing system in nitrogen gas ambient. The 15-nm-thick $SiO_2$ control layer was deposited by using ultra-high vacuum magnetron sputtering. For $SiO_2$ layer density, the second post annealing process was carried out at $900^{\circ}C$ for 30 seconds by using rapid thermal annealing system in nitrogen gas ambient. The aluminum gate electrodes of 200-nm thickness were formed by thermal evaporation. The electrical properties of devices were measured by using a HP 4156A precision semiconductor parameter analyzer with HP 41501A pulse generator, an Agillent 81104A 80MHz pulse/pattern generator and an Agillent E5250A low leakage switch mainframe. We will discuss the electrical properties for application next generation non-volatile memory device.

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Aerodynamic interaction between static vehicles and wind barriers on railway bridges exposed to crosswinds

  • Huoyue, Xiang;Yongle, Li;Bin, Wang
    • Wind and Structures
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    • v.20 no.2
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    • pp.237-247
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    • 2015
  • Wind tunnel experiments are used to investigate the aerodynamic interactions between vehicles and wind barriers on a railway bridge. Wind barriers with four different heights (1.72 m, 2.05 m, 2.5 m and 2.95 m, full-scale) and three different porosities (0%, 30% and 40%) are studied to yield the aerodynamic coefficients of the vehicle and the wind barriers. The effects of the wind barriers on the aerodynamic coefficients of the vehicle are analyzed as well as the effects of the vehicle on the aerodynamic coefficients of the wind barriers. Finally, the relationship between the drag forces on the wind barriers and the aerodynamic coefficients of the vehicle are discussed. The results show that the wind barriers can significantly reduce the drag coefficients of the vehicle, but that porous wind barriers increase the lift forces on the vehicle. The windward vehicle will significantly reduce the drag coefficients of the porous wind barriers, but the windward and leeward vehicle will increase the drag coefficients of the solid wind barrier. The overturning moment coefficient is a linear function of the drag forces on the wind barriers if the full-scale height of the wind barriers $h{\leq}2.5m$ and the overturning moment coefficients $C_O{\geq}0$.

Rapid Theraml Annealing Effect on the Magnetic Tunnel Junction with MgO Tunnel Barrier (MgO 절연막을 갖는 자기 터널 접합구조에서의 급속 열처리 효과)

  • Min, Kiljoon;Lee, Kyungil;Kim, Taewan;Jang, Joonyeon
    • Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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    • v.25 no.2
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    • pp.47-51
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    • 2015
  • To achieve a high tunneling magneto resistance (TMR) of sputtered magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) with an MgO barrier, the annealing process is indispensable. The structural and compositional changes as consequences of the annealing greatly affect the spin-dependent transport properties of MTJs. Higher TMR could be obtained for MTJs annealed at higher annealing temperature. The diffusion of Ru, Mn and/or Ta in the MTJs may occur during annealing process, which is known to be detrimental to spin-dependent tunneling effect. The rapid thermal annealing (RTA) process was used for annealing the MTJs with synthetic antiferromagnets. To suppress the diffusion of Mn, Ru and/or Ta in the MTJs, the process time and temperature of RTA were minutely controlled.

Comparison of Tunneling Characteristics in the MTJs of CoFeB/MgO/CoFeB with Lower and Higher Tunneling Magnetoresistance

  • Choi, G.M.;Shin, K.H.;Seo, S.A.;Lim, W.C.;Lee, T.D.
    • Journal of Magnetics
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    • v.14 no.1
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    • pp.11-14
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    • 2009
  • We investigated the I-V curves and differential tunneling conductance of two, CoFeB/MgO/CoFeB-based, magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs): one with a low tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR; 22%) and the other with a high TMR (352%). This huge TMR difference was achieved by different MgO sputter conditions rather than by different annealing or deposition temperature. In addition to the TMR difference, the junction resistances were much higher in the low-TMR MTJ than in the high-TMR MTJ. The low-TMR MTJ showed a clear parabolic behavior in the dI/dV-V curve. This high resistance and parabolic behavior were well explained by the Simmons' simple barrier model. However, the tunneling properties of the high-TMR MTJ could not be explained by this model. The characteristic tunneling properties of the high-TMR MTJ were a relatively low junction resistance, a linear relation in the I-V curve, and conduction dips in the differential tunneling conductance. We explained these features by applying the coherent tunneling model.

Magnetoresistance Characteristics of Magnetic Tunnel Junctions Consisting of Amorphous CoNbZr Alloys for Under and Capping Layers

  • Chun, Byong Sun;Lee, Seong-Rae;Kim, Young Keun
    • Journal of Magnetics
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    • v.9 no.1
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    • pp.13-16
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    • 2004
  • Magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) comprising amorphous CoNbZr layers have been investigated. $Co_{85.5}Nb_8Zr_{6.5}$(in at. %) layers were employed to substitute the traditionally used Ta layers with an emphasis given on under-standing underlayer effect. The typical junction structure was $SiO_2/CoNbZr$ or Ta 2/CoFe 8/IrMn 7.5/CoFe 3/Al 1.6 + oxidation/CoFe 3/CoNbZr or Ta 2 (nm). For both as-deposited state and after annealing, the CoNbZr-underlayered structure showed superior surface smoothness up to the tunnel barrier than Ta-underlayerd one (rms roughness of 0.16 vs. 0.34 nm). CoNbZr-based MTJs was proven beneficial for increasing thermal stability and increasing $V_h$ (the bias voltage where MR ratio becomes half) characteristics than Ta-based MTJs. This is because the CoNbZr-based junctions offer smoother interface structure than the Ta-based one.