Formation of Cu nanocrystals on 3-mercaptopropyltrimethoxysilane monolayer by pulsed iodine-assisted chemical vapor deposition for nonvolatile memory applications

We fabricated nonvolatile nanocrystal flash memory using Cu nanocrystals deposited at 110 degrees C by pulsed iodine-assisted chemical vapor deposition (CVD) as the charge storage elements. The Cu nanocrystals are deposited on 3-mercaptopropyltrimethoxysilane (MPTMS) coated SiO2 (4 nm) thermally grown on Si, followed by the coating of MPTMS on the Cu nanoparticles to immobilize the Cu atoms. This novel device structure is simply fabricated by pulsed CVD and exhibits a threshold voltage shift of 1.9 V after the application of a voltage pulse (erase: -14 V, 1 ms/program: 40 V, 1 ms) to the gate and has reliable data retention characteristics.