Planar nanoscale vacuum channel transistors based on resistive switching

Abstract Resistance switching (RS) offers promising applications in a variety of areas. In particular, silicon oxide (SiO x ) under RS can serve as electron sources in new types of miniature vacuum electron tubes. In this work, planar nanoscale vacuum channel transistors (NVCTs) with graphene electrodes and RS SiO x electron sources were developed. In each RS-NVCT, the resistance between the ground and the gate underwent high–low–high transitions, which resulted from formation and subsequent rupture of Si conducting filaments. Electrons were emitted from the post-reset Si filaments and the current received by the collector ( I C ) was well controlled by the gate voltage ( V G ). The transfer characteristics reveal that I C was quite sensitive to V G when RS occurred. With V G sweeping from 0 to −20 V, the obtained subthreshold swing (SS) of 76 mV dec −1 was quite close to the theoretical limit of the SS of a field effect transistor at room temperature (60 mV dec −1 ). The largest ON/OFF ratio was of the order of 10 6 . The output characteristics of the devices indicate that the dependence of I C on the collector voltage ( V C ) weakened at high V C values. These results demonstrate the application potential of RS-NVCTs as either switching devices or amplifiers.