Picoampere Resistive Switching Characteristics Realized with Vertically Contacted Carbon Nanotube Atomic Force Microscope Probe

The resistive switching characteristics of a TiO2/Ti structure have been investigated using a conductive atomic force microscopy (AFM) system with 5-nm-diameter carbon nanotube (CNT) probes. The resistive switching showed bipolar resistive random access memory (ReRAM) behaviors with extremely low switching currents in the order of Picoamperes when voltages were applied. From transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observation, we confirmed that filament-like nanocrystals, having a diameter of about 10 nm, existed in TiO2 films at resistive switching areas after not only set operation but also reset operation. Moreover, photoemission electron microscopy (PEEM) analysis showed that the anatase-type TiO2 structure did not change after set and reset operations. From these results, we suggested that the Picoampere resistive switching occurred at the interface between the TiO2 dielectric and conductive nanocrystal without any structural changes in the TiO2 film and nanocrystal. The resistive switching mechanism we suggested is highly promising to realize extremely low-power-consumption ReRAMs with vertically contacted CNT electrodes.

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