Characteristics of nitrogen plasma immersion ion implantation treatment on gadolinium oxide resistive switching random access memory

The effect of nitrogen plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII) treatment on the thin films of gadolinium oxide (GdxOy) for use in resistive random access memory (RRAM) applications is reported. From the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopic analysis, the formation of Gd-N bond was evidenced by a shift in the peak Gd 4d peaks towards lower binding energy. It was observed that the nitrogen PIII treatment enhanced the product yield of the GdxOy RRAM up to 77%. With the nitrogen PIII treatment, the switching mechanism of the GdxOy RRAMs changed from Schottky emission to space-charge-limited-current conduction, as determined by the current-voltage fitting and device-area-dependent measurements. The nitrogen PIII-treated GdxOy RRAMs prepared in this study could provide a high resistance ratio of 104, suitable for future application as non-volatile memory.