Radiation-Hardening Techniques for Spin Orbit Torque-MRAM Peripheral Circuitry

Magnetic random access memory (MRAM) is experimentally proved intrinsically immune to radiation effects including heavy-ion irradiation and total ion dose as the data are represented by the spin instead of charges. Hence, it is considered as a promising candidate for aerospace and avionic electronics. However, its CMOS peripheral read/write circuits are much more vulnerable to radiation-induced single-event upset (SEU) and double-node upset (DNU) induced by charge sharing. This paper presents a novel radiation-hardening design of the peripheral circuitry for spin orbit torque (SOT)-MRAM to address abovementioned issues effectively. Transient simulations are performed based on a physics-based SOT-magnetic tunnel junction compact model and a 65 nm CMOS design kit. Simulation results validate that the proposed hardening read/write circuits are strongly robust against SEUs and DNUs. Furthermore, the proposed hardening read circuit shows the improvement of hardware area and reliability compared with the previous works.

[1]  S. Auffret,et al.  Ultrafast magnetization switching by spin-orbit torques , 2013, 1310.5586.

[2]  Lionel Torres,et al.  Radiative Effects on MRAM-Based Non-Volatile Elementary Structures , 2015, 2015 IEEE Computer Society Annual Symposium on VLSI.

[3]  K. Ounadjela,et al.  Effects of swift heavy ion bombardment on magnetic tunnel junction functional properties , 2003 .

[4]  Rui Liu,et al.  A 10-Transistor 65 nm SRAM Cell Tolerant to Single-Event Upsets , 2016, J. Electron. Test..

[5]  J. S. Browning,et al.  An SEU Tolerant Memory Cell Derived from Fundamental Studies of SEU Mechanisms in SRAM , 1987, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[6]  M.V. O'Bryan,et al.  Compendium of Recent Total Ionizing Dose Results for Candidate Spacecraft Electronics for NASA , 2008, 2008 IEEE Radiation Effects Data Workshop.

[7]  R. A. Reed,et al.  Radiation Studies of Spin-Transfer Torque Materials and Devices , 2012, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[8]  Kyung-Jin Lee,et al.  Emerging Three-Terminal Magnetic Memory Devices , 2016, Proceedings of the IEEE.

[9]  Gregory di Pendina,et al.  Hybrid CMOS/magnetic Process Design Kit and SOT-based non-volatile standard cell architectures , 2014, 2014 19th Asia and South Pacific Design Automation Conference (ASP-DAC).

[10]  Weisheng Zhao,et al.  A radiation hardened hybrid spintronic/CMOS nonvolatile unit using magnetic tunnel junctions , 2014 .

[11]  T. Devolder,et al.  Self-Enabled “Error-Free” Switching Circuit for Spin Transfer Torque MRAM and Logic , 2012, IEEE Transactions on Magnetics.

[12]  Miss A.O. Penney.  (b) , 1974, The New Yale Book of Quotations.

[13]  Zhaohao Wang,et al.  High-Density NAND-Like Spin Transfer Torque Memory With Spin Orbit Torque Erase Operation , 2018, IEEE Electron Device Letters.

[14]  B.L. Bhuva,et al.  Charge Collection and Charge Sharing in a 130 nm CMOS Technology , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[15]  Ahmad Patooghy,et al.  Low energy single event upset/single event transient-tolerant latch for deep subMicron technologies , 2009, IET Comput. Digit. Tech..

[16]  Kyeong-Sik Min,et al.  Self-Adaptive Write Circuit for Low-Power and Variation-Tolerant Memristors , 2010, IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology.

[17]  Kaushik Roy,et al.  Spin-Transfer Torque Memories: Devices, Circuits, and Systems , 2016, Proceedings of the IEEE.

[18]  P. E. Dodd,et al.  Physics of Multiple-Node Charge Collection and Impacts on Single-Event Characterization and Soft Error Rate Prediction , 2013, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[19]  Jing Guo,et al.  Novel Low-Power and Highly Reliable Radiation Hardened Memory Cell for 65 nm CMOS Technology , 2014, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers.

[20]  Shoji Ikeda,et al.  Influence of Heavy Ion Irradiation on Perpendicular-Anisotropy CoFeB-MgO Magnetic Tunnel Junctions , 2013, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[21]  Mohamed I. Elmasry,et al.  Modeling and comparing CMOS implementations of the C-element , 1998, IEEE Trans. Very Large Scale Integr. Syst..

[22]  Fanghui Ren,et al.  Radiation Tolerance of Magnetic Tunnel Junctions With MgO Tunnel Barriers , 2012, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[23]  Lloyd W. Massengill,et al.  Basic mechanisms and modeling of single-event upset in digital microelectronics , 2003 .

[24]  Claude Chappert,et al.  Hardening Techniques for MRAM-Based Nonvolatile Latches and Logic , 2012, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.