Monatomic phase change memory

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that monatomic antimony can serve as an effective phase change memory material at nanoscale, simplifying composition control and potentially enhancing device miniaturization.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of using a single-element material, antimony, for phase change memory, addressing miniaturization challenges and compositional variability.

Findings

Monatomic antimony can function as a phase change memory material.

Nanoscale confinement of antimony simplifies compositional control.

Eliminating complex doping reduces variability in device performance.

Abstract

Phase change memory has been developed into a mature technology capable of storing information in a fast and non-volatile way, with potential for neuromorphic computing applications. However, its future impact in electronics depends crucially on how the materials at the core of this technology adapt to the requirements arising from continued scaling towards higher device densities. A common strategy to finetune the properties of phase change memory materials, reaching reasonable thermal stability in optical data storage, relies on mixing precise amounts of different dopants, resulting often in quaternary or even more complicated compounds. Here we show how the simplest material imaginable, a single element (in this case, antimony), can become a valid alternative when confined in extremely small volumes. This compositional simplification eliminates problems related to unwanted deviations from the optimized stoichiometry in the switching volume, which become increasingly pressing when devices are aggressively miniaturized. Removing compositional optimization issues may allow one to capitalize on nanosize effects in information storage.