In this paper, we demonstrate retention improvement in nonvolatile charge-trapping memory cells by tunneling oxide engineering with Al 2 O 3 . By utilizing SiO 2 /Al 2 O 3 /SiO 2 layers for the tunneling oxide, it is shown that the threshold voltage window after 10 years is significantly improved from 0.78 V to 4.18 V through Synopsys Sentaurus technology computer-aided design simulation. In addition, retention improvement from incorporating SiO 2 /Al 2 O 3 /SiO 2 tunneling layers is compared with that using SiO 2 /Si 3 N 4 /SiO 2 tunneling layers. The relationship between charge-trapping layer thickness and trapped charge emission is also investigated. As a result, we open up the possibility of using HfO 2 as a charge-trapping layer with significant reliability enhancement.
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