Effect of Annealing Temperature for Ni/AlO(x)/Pt RRAM Devices Fabricated with Solution-Based Dielectric

Resistive random access memory (RRAM) devices with Ni/AlO(x)/Pt-structure were manufactured by deposition of a solution-based aluminum oxide (AlO(x)) dielectric layer which was subsequently annealed at temperatures from 200 °C to 300 °C, in increments of 25 °C. The devices displayed typical bipolar resistive switching characteristics. Investigations were carried out on the effect of different annealing temperatures for associated RRAM devices to show that performance was correlated with changes of hydroxyl group concentration in the AlO(x) thin films. The annealing temperature of 250 °C was found to be optimal for the dielectric layer, exhibiting superior performance of the RRAM devices with the lowest operation voltage (<1.5 V), the highest ON/OFF ratio (>10(4)), the narrowest resistance distribution, the longest retention time (>10(4) s) and the most endurance cycles (>150).