Origin of resistance state relaxation and nonvolatile features in NiO films: Interfacial vs filamentary resistive switching

NiO films grown on Pt and Nb:SrTiO3 (NSTO) substrates display filament-type and interface-type resistance switching (RS), respectively. The resistance retention studies show that these two different RSs also lead to distinct resistance evolutions. For Pt/NiO/Pt, both high and low resistance states have good retention property, demonstrating that the conducting filament is stable once it is formed. However, for Pt/NiO/NSTO/In, all resistance states show time-relaxation, and the relaxation trend depends on the polarity of the write bias. The resistive relaxation and nonvolatile features are attributed to the charge migration and electron trapping scenario, respectively. (c) 2020 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).