Intel Corporation

Justin Brockman

Christopher J Wiegand

Oleg Golonzka

Kaan Oguz

Brian S Doyle

Kevin O'Brien

Mark L Doczy

Daniel Ouellette

Tahir Ghani

Angeline Smith

Tofizur Rahman

Md Tofizur Rahman

Andrew Smith

Robert S Chau

Brian Maertz

Huiying Liu

Ravi Pillarisetty

Prashant Majhi

Charles C Kuo

Elijah V Karpov

Juan G Alzate Vinasco

Juan G Alzate-Vinasco

James Pellegren

Niloy Mukherjee

Uday Shah

Satyarth Suri

Markus Kuhn

Ryan E Arch

Michael Robinson

Pedro Quintero

Aaron Littlejohn

Sasikanth Manipatruni

Ian A Young

Tanay Gosavi

Noriyuki Sato

Daniel B Bergstrom

Conor P Puls

Yu-Jin Chen

Stephen Wu

Juan Alzate Vinasco

Tanmoy Pramanik

Daniel G Oeullette

Daniel Ouelette

James ODonnell

A memory device includes a bottom electrode, a conductive layer such as an alloy including ruthenium and tungsten above the bottom electrode and a perpendicular magnetic tunnel junction (pMTJ) on the conductive layer. In an embodiment, the pMTJ includes a fixed magnet, a tunnel barrier above the fixed magnet and a free magnet on the tunnel barrier. The memory device further includes a synthetic antiferromagnetic (SAF) structure that is ferromagnetically coupled with the fixed magnet to pin a magnetization of the fixed magnet. The conductive layer has a crystal texture which promotes high quality FCC &#x3c;111&#x3e; crystal texture in the SAF structure and improves perpendicular magnetic anisotropy of the fixed magnet.

Conductive alloy layer in magnetic memory devices and methods of fabrication

A memory device includes a first electrode, a conductive layer including iridium above the first electrode and a magnetic junction directly on the conductive layer. The magnetic junction further includes a pinning structure above the conductive layer, a fixed magnet above the pinning structure, a tunnel barrier on the fixed magnet, a free magnet on the tunnel barrier layer and a second electrode above the free magnet. The conductive layer including iridium and the pinning structure including iridium provide switching efficiency.

Magnetic memory devices and methods of fabrication

A memory device includes a perpendicular magnetic tunnel junction (pMTJ) stack, between a bottom electrode and a top electrode. In an embodiment, the pMTJ includes a fixed magnet, a tunnel barrier above the fixed magnet and a free magnet structure on the tunnel barrier. The free magnet structure includes a first free magnet on the tunnel barrier and a second free magnet above the first free magnet, wherein at least a portion of the free magnet proximal to an interface with the free magnet includes a transition metal. The free magnet structure having a transition metal between the first and the second free magnets advantageously improves the switching efficiency of the MTJ, while maintaining a thermal stability of at least 50 kT.

Magnetic memory devices with a transition metal dopant at an interface of free magnetic layers and methods of fabrication

An apparatus comprises a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) including a free magnetic layer, a fixed magnetic layer, and a tunnel barrier between the free and fixed layers, the tunnel barrier directly contacting a first side of the free layer, a capping layer contacting the second side of the free magnetic layer and boron absorption layer positioned a fixed distance above the capping layer.

Perpendicular spin transfer torque magnetic mechanism

Material stacks for perpendicular spin transfer torque memory (pSTTM) devices, pSTTM devices and computing platforms employing such material stacks, and methods for forming them are discussed. The material stacks include a cladding layer of predominantly tungsten on a protective layer, which is in turn on an oxide capping layer over a magnetic junction stack. The cladding layer reduces oxygen dissociation from the oxide capping layer for improved thermal stability and retention.

Perpendicular spin transfer torque devices with improved retention and thermal stability

A material layer stack for a pSTTM memory device includes a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) stack, a oxide layer, a protective layer and a capping layer. The MTJ includes a fixed magnetic layer, a tunnel barrier disposed above the fixed magnetic layer and a free magnetic layer disposed on the tunnel barrier. The oxide layer, which enables an increase in perpendicularity of the pSTTM material layer stack, is disposed on the free magnetic layer. The protective layer is disposed on the oxide layer, and acts as a protective barrier to the oxide from physical sputter damage during subsequent layer deposition. A conductive capping layer with a low oxygen affinity is disposed on the protective layer to reduce iron-oxygen de-hybridization at the interface between the free magnetic layer and the oxide layer. The inherent non-oxygen scavenging nature of the conductive capping layer enhances stability and reduces retention loss in pSTTM devices.

Perpendicular spin transfer torque memory (pSTTM) devices with enhanced stability and method to form same

A memory device method of fabrication that includes a first electrode having a first conductive layer including titanium and nitrogen and a second conductive layer on the first conductive layer that includes tantalum and nitrogen. The memory device further includes a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) on the first electrode. In some embodiments, at least a portion of the first conductive layer proximal to an interface with the second conductive layer includes oxygen.

Magnetic memory devices with layered electrodes and methods of fabrication

A perpendicular spin orbit torque (SOT) memory device includes an electrode having a spin orbit coupling material and a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) device on a portion of the electrode. The electrode has a first SOC layer and a second SOC layer on a portion of the first SOC layer, where at least a portion of the first SOC layer at an interface with the second SOC layer includes oxygen.

Spin orbit torque (SOT) memory devices and methods of fabrication

A memory device includes a first electrode, a second electrode and a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) between the first electrode and the second electrode. The MTJ includes a fixed magnet, a free magnet and a tunnel barrier between the fixed magnet and the free magnet. The MTJ further includes a conductive layer between the free magnet and the second electrode, the conductive layer having a metallic dopant, where the metallic dopant has a concentration that increase with distance from an interface between the free magnet and the conductive layer. A capping layer is between the conductive layer and the second electrode.

A memory device includes a first electrode, a conductive layer including iridium above the first electrode, a magnetic junction on the conductive layer and a second electrode above the magnetic junction. The magnetic junction includes a magnetic structure including a first magnetic layer including cobalt, a non-magnetic layer including platinum or tungsten on the first magnetic layer and a second magnetic layer including cobalt on the non-magnetic layer. The magnetic junction further includes an anti-ferromagnetic layer on the magnet structure, a fixed magnet above the anti-ferromagnetic layer, a free magnet above the fixed magnet and a tunnel barrier between the fixed magnet and the free magnet.

Magnetic memory devices with enhanced tunnel magnetoresistance ratio (TMR) and methods of fabrication

Resistive memory cells, precursors thereof, and methods of making resistive memory cells are described. In some embodiments, the resistive memory cells are formed from a resistive memory precursor that includes a switching layer precursor containing a plurality of oxygen vacancies that are present in a controlled distribution therein, optionally without the use of an oxygen exchange layer. In these or other embodiments, the resistive memory precursors described may include a second electrode formed on a switching layer precursor, wherein the second electrode is includes a second electrode material that is conductive but which does not substantially react with oxygen. Devices including resistive memory cells are also described.

Resistive memory cells and precursors thereof, methods of making the same, and devices including the same

Strain engineering of perpendicular magnetic tunnel junctions (PMTJs) is described. In an example, a memory structure includes a perpendicular magnetic tunnel junction (pMTJ) element disposed above a substrate. A lateral strain-inducing material layer is disposed on the pMTJ element. An inter-layer dielectric (ILD) layer disposed laterally adjacent to both the pMTJ element and the lateral strain-inducing material layer.

Approaches for strain engineering of perpendicular magnetic tunnel junctions (pMTJs) and the resulting structures

MTJ material stacks, pSTTM devices employing such stacks, and computing platforms employing such pSTTM devices. In some embodiments, perpendicular MTJ material stacks include a multi-layered filter stack disposed between a fixed magnetic layer and an antiferromagnetic layer or synthetic antiferromagnetic (SAF) stack. In some embodiments, non-magnetic layers of the filter stack include at least one of Ta, Mo, Nb, W, or Hf. These transition metals may be in pure form or alloyed with other constituents.

PSTTM device with multi-layered filter stack

An embodiment includes an apparatus including: a substrate; a perpendicular magnetic tunnel junction (pMTJ), on the substrate, including a first fixed layer, a second fixed layer, and a free layer between the first and second fixed layers; a first dielectric layer between the first fixed layer and the free layer; and a second layer between the second fixed layer and the free layer. Other embodiments are described herein.

Perpendicular magnetic memory with symmetric fixed layers

Material layer stack structures to provide a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) having improved perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) characteristics. In an embodiment, a free magnetic layer of the material layer stack is disposed between a tunnel barrier layer and a cap layer of magnesium oxide (Mg). The free magnetic layer includes a Cobalt-Iron-Boron (CoFeB) body substantially comprised of a combination of Cobalt atoms, Iron atoms and Boron atoms. A first Boron mass fraction of the CoFeB body is equal to or more than 25% (e.g., equal to or more than 27%) in a first region which adjoins an interface of the free magnetic layer with the tunnel barrier layer. In another embodiment, the first Boron mass fraction is more than a second Boron mass fraction in a second region of the CoFeB body which adjoins an interface of the free magnetic layer with the cap layer.

Growing community of inventors

Portland, OR, United States of America

Justin Brockman