Sub 10 ns fast switching and resistance control in lateral GeTe-based phase-change memory

Abstract In this study, we investigated the fast switching and resistance control in a lateral GeTe-based phase-change memory (PCM). The resistivity of GeTe as a function of annealing temperature showed that it changed by more than 6 orders of magnitude in a very narrow temperature range. X-ray diffraction patterns of GeTe films indicated that GeTe had only one crystal structure, that is, face-centered cubic. It was demonstrated that the lateral device with a top conducting layer had a good performance. The operation characteristics of the GeTe-based lateral PCM device showed that it could be operated even when sub-10-ns voltage pulses were applied, making it much faster than a Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 -based device. The device resistance was successfully controlled by applying a staircase-like pulse, which enables the device to be used for fast multilevel storage.