Study of the Resistive Switching Characteristics and Mechanisms of Pt/CeOx/TiN Structure for RRAM Applications

Pt (top)/CeOx/TiN (bottom) sandwich structures with nonstoichiometric CeOx (1.3 < x < 2) films were fabricated by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering system. Their reproducible resistive switching characteristics were study systematically for resistive random access memory (RRAM) applications. The X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was performed to analyze the mechanisms of resistive switching (RS) of CeOx-based films. The results show that both the oxygen vacancies in the CeOx film and the interfacial TiON layer formed between the dielectric CeOx film and the TiN bottom electrode play important roles in the observed RS behaviors.