Permanent Strain Engineering of Molybdenum Disulfide Using Laser-Driven Stressors for Energy-Efficient Resistive Switching Memory Devices

Strain engineering provides an attractive approach to enhance device performance by modulating the intrinsic electrical properties of materials. This is especially applicable to 2D materials, which exhibit high sensitivity to mechanical stress. However, conventional methods, such as using polymer substrates, to apply strain have limitations in that the strain is temporary and global. Here, we introduce a novel approach to induce permanent localized strain by fabricating a stressor on SiO2/Si substrates using fiber laser irradiation, thereby enabling precise control of the surface topography. MoS2 is transferred onto this stressor, which results in the application of ~0.8% tensile strain. To assess the impact of the internal strain on the operation of ReRAM devices, the flat-MoS2-based and the strained-MoS2-based devices are compared. Both devices demonstrate forming-free, bipolar, and non-volatile switching characteristics. The strained devices exhibit a 30% reduction in the operating voltage, which can be attributed to bandgap narrowing and enhanced carrier mobility. Furthermore, the strained devices exhibit nearly a two-fold improvement in endurance, presumably because of the enhanced stability from lattice release effect. These results emphasize the potential of strain engineering for advancing the performance and durability of next-generation memory devices.