학술논문

JSWof 5.5 MA/cm2 and RA of 5.2-Ω · μm2 STT-MRAM Technology for LLC Application
Document Type
Periodical
Source
IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices IEEE Trans. Electron Devices Electron Devices, IEEE Transactions on. 67(9):3618-3625 Sep, 2020
Subject
Components, Circuits, Devices and Systems
Engineered Materials, Dielectrics and Plasmas
Magnetic tunneling
Switches
Computer architecture
Resistance
Switching circuits
Microprocessors
Random access memory
5 nm
cache
last level cache
LLC
spin-transfer torque (STT)-MRAM
Language
ISSN
0018-9383
1557-9646
Abstract
Due to the complexity of device processing, the trade-off between yield and area has resulted in diminishing rate of scaling for the high-density static random access memory (SRAM) cell at advanced CMOS nodes. An introduction of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) and multipatterning has added additional cost to technology in order to realize 3-D device structure and ultrascaled metal routing. In this era, spin-transfer torque (STT)-MRAM technology can provide an alternative to high-density SRAM and for the last level cache (LLC) applications. In this article, we discuss the memory design and technology tradeoff to enable the STT-MRAM as a viable option. We have realized the technology over 300-mm wafer, measuring 1 million samples to build a SPICE model for circuit simulation. Occupying up to 83.3% of an area that of SRAM macro has been designed and simulated for the scaled 5-nm CMOS node. The simulated MRAM macro shows the best read and write access time of 3.1 and 6.2 ns, respectively. Magnetic tunneling junction (MTJ) pillar of 38-nm diameter is realized at 90-nm pitch, measuring resistance area (RA) of 5.2- $\Omega \cdot \mu \text{m}^{2}$ , ${J}_{sw}$ of 5.5 MA/cm 2 with improved $\Delta $ avg of 70, and breakdown voltage of 0.99 V. The energy comparison shows increasing gains versus SRAM for the increasing cache sizes crossing over at of 0.3 and 4 MB for the single-cycle read and write operations, respectively.