High Endurance Ferroelectric Hafnium Oxide-Based FeFET Memory Without Retention Penalty

We report the integration of a ferroelectric (FE) silicon-doped hafnium oxide material in ferroelectric field-effect transistor (FeFET) devices fabricated with an optimized interfacial layer in a gate-first scheme. The effect of increasing the permittivity (k) value of the interface layer on the performance of the metal-ferroelectric-insulator-semiconductor (MFIS)-FE-HfO2 FeFET is studied in terms of its switching characteristics, endurance, and retention. In contrast to the previous work, the FE Si:HfO2-integrated FeFET devices show a low-power operation capability as well as an improved endurance characteristics without jeopardizing high-temperature retention. The utilization of an optimized SiON interface layer for MFIS-HfO2 FeFET stack is discussed, and the improvements are outlined with reference to a standard low-k SiO2 interface.