Effect of Hydrogen on Hafnium Zirconium Oxide Fabricated by Atomic Layer Deposition Using H₂O₂ Oxidant

Abstract

Hafnium zirconium oxide (HZO) has been studied intensively due to its potential application to memory and logic devices based on its outstanding dielectric and ferroelectric properties. Because many process factors can significantly impact the properties of HZO thin film, an optimized process or post-treatment is necessary to ensure its performance. Herein, the effect of hydrogen on HZO thin film can make the film degraded. Analysis of the polarization-voltage hysteresis loops and I-V measurements indicate a leaky behavior in the film. To address this issue, post-oxygen-plasma treatment is performed on the film, which results in the decrease in hydrogen ions inside the film and consequently reduces the leakage current density. This finding can provide new insight into the effect of hydrogen incorporation for HZO thin films and methodology to remove leaky components inside ferroelectric films using O 2 plasma treatment.

Scaled, Ferroelectric Memristive Synapse for Back‐End‐of‐Line Integration with Neuromorphic Hardware

“…Such states could originate from the presence of oxygen vacancies, but also from hydrogen trapped in the lattice during the atomic layer deposition. [54] From Figure 7c and Equation (2), we found that the resistive switching originates from an increase by one order of magnitude in the μN C product in the LRS compared to the HRS. At large fields (below −600 mV and above 1.5 V) the I-V characteristics keep the same diode-like polarity regardless of the polarization direction, showing that the energy band diagram of the TiN/HZO/WO x junction is not structurally modified upon polarization reversal as, for example, in refs.…”

“…Such states could originate from the presence of oxygen vacancies, but also from hydrogen trapped in the lattice during the atomic layer deposition. [ 54 ] From Figure 7c and Equation (), we found that the resistive switching originates from an increase by one order of magnitude in the μN C product in the LRS compared to the HRS.…”

Back‐End‐of‐Line Integration of Synaptic Weights using HfO2/ZrO2Nanolaminates

“…[ 58 ] In ALD thin films, they can originate from hydrogen incorporation. [ 59 ] Ohmic conduction is analytically described by $$$$\begin{equation}J = \sigma E = \mu q{N}_{\mathrm{C}}{\mathrm{exp}}\left[ {\frac{{ - \left( {{E}_{\mathrm{C}} - {E}_{\mathrm{F}}} \right)}}{{kT}}} \right]E\end{equation}$$$$equivalent to $$$$\begin{equation}{\mathrm{Log}}\left( J \right) = {\mathrm{Log}}\left( {\mu q{N}_{\mathrm{C}}/t} \right) + \frac{{ - \left( {{E}_{\mathrm{C}} - {E}_{\mathrm{F}}} \right)}}{k} \times \frac{1}{T} + {\mathrm{Log}}\left( V \right)\end{equation}$$$$where J is the current density, σ the electrical conductivity, µ the electron mobility, 𝑞 the electronic charge, N C is the effective density of states of the conduction band, t is the sample thickness, E C − E F is the energy difference between the conduction band and the Fermi level, k the Boltzmann constant, T the absolute temperature, and E is the electric field across the ferroelectric layer.…”

“…[58] In ALD thin films, they can originate from hydrogen incorporation. [59] Ohmic conduction is analytically described by…”