Adityanarayan Pandey, Lucía Pérez Ramírez, Eun Jin Koh, and Nicolas Vaxelaire (CEA Leti) recently completed micro-X-ray diffraction (μ-XRD) experiments on the DIFFABS beamline at the SOLEIL synchrotron (Saint Aubin, France).

The objective of this session was to investigate the structural phase transformations and strain evolution in hafnium-zirconium oxide (HfₓZr₁₋ₓO₂, or HZO) ferroelectric capacitors (FeCAPs), with cycling conditions. TiN/HZO/TiN capacitors, where the total HZO layer thicknesses were 5, 7, and 9 nm and the compositional variants of the Hf:Zr ratio (1:2, 1:1, and 2:1) were studied. The HZO thin films were supplied by Uwe Schroeder’s team at NaMLab gGmbH (Dresden, Germany) while the single FeCAPs were fabricated at CEA Saclay at the SPEC nanofab facility.

 This work supported by the ANR-DFG D3PO and Ferro4EdgeAI projects (https://www.ferro4edgeai.eu/ ). The team gratefully acknowledges the expert support of beamline scientist Cristian Mocuta.

We are happy to announce that our work has been recently published in scientific reports. The article is entitled “Bias dependent band alignment in Ga2O3 ferroelectric interface by operando HAXPES”. This the key result of the GO-FERRO project, funded by the AFOSR (the Air Force Office of Scientfic Research), collaboration with the team of Tyson Back AFRL (Air Force Research Laboratory), experiments done on the Galaxies beamline at Soleil synchrotron.

We are happy to announce that our work has been recently published in Applied Physics Letters. The article is entitled “Oxygen vacancy distribution and phase composition in scaled, Hf0.5Zr0.5O2-based ferroelectric capacitors”.

https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0245595

A new PhD position is open in our laboraory. Its title is : “Advanced characterization of ferroelectric domains in hafnia-based thin films”, funded by the PEPR Ferrofutures (https://www.pepr-electronique.fr/fer/) and the Horizon EuropeFerro4edgeAI project (https://www.ferro4edgeai.eu/).

Don’t hesitate to dive deeper into the subject in our “Open positions” section.

If you’re interested, you can contact:

nick.barrett@cea.fr/lucia.perezramirez@cea.fr

We are delighted to announce that the HREELM project is one of this year’s laureats of the SESAME 2024 call, supported by the Ile-de-France region

The aim

Imaging for the first time the surface vibrational states with nanometric spatial resolution

This will be done by full filed imaging of loss energy electron energy losses in real and reciprocal space at high spatial (15 nm) spectral (5 meV) and wave-vector (40 cm^-1) resolutions.

More information can be found in the project section !

Santiago defended his PhD and answered brillantly the jury members questions (from left to right : Jérôme Wolfman, Eugénie Martinez, Maria Christine Richter, Mathieu Frégneaux, Nick Barrett and Bruno Domenichini)

Once again, congratulations !

Dr. Kale Somnath Dadabhau completed his PhD at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Berhampur, India, where his research focused on investigating the effects of size and boundary conditions in ferroelectric thin films and tunnel junctions. Before his doctoral studies, he earned a Master’s degree in Physics from the Department of Physics, Savitribai Phule Pune University, India. Dr. Kale previously worked as a postdoctoral researcher at IISER Berhampur, where he focused on multiferroic tunnel junctions for next-generation non-volatile memories. His research interests include Material science, nanoelectronics, and the application of thin films in memory devices and energy-efficient technologies. He has received several awards, including the IEEE and SERB Travel Awards, as well as the Sanjay Shewale Prize for academic excellence.

He has recently joined LENSIS as a postdoctoral researcher to work on the project Ferro4EdgeAI, “Scalable Ferroelectric-Based Accelerators for Energy Efficient Edge AI.” This project focuses on developing ultra-low-power, scalable edge accelerators for artificial intelligence, incorporating a memory-augmented neural network based on low-cost, high-density, multi-level, Back End of Line (BEoL) integrated ferroelectric (FE) technology. The project is conducted in collaboration with Horizon Europe CL4, Leti, NaMLab, INL, TU Delft, STMicroelectronics, FMC, and SynSense.

“During my poster presentation on "Polarization Dependent Oxygen Vacancy Distribution in Ferroelectric Hf₀.₅Zr₀.₅O₂ Capacitors," I engaged in meaningful discussions with notable experts in the field, including Prof. Hwang, Prof. Jeon and Dr. Mueller. Key questions arose during these interactions: Prof. Datta inquired about the mechanisms behind oxygen vacancy migration under varying polarization conditions, which led me to explain the influence of built-in electric fields.  I gained valuable insights into several fundamental physics concepts. I learned about the dynamics of oxygen vacancies, revealing how their migration affects device reliability and functionality. I explored energy barriers associated with vacancy movement and the significant role of built-in electric fields in shaping vacancy distribution. This understanding highlighted the challenges related to wake-up and fatigue effects in ferroelectric devices. Additionally, discussions on optimizing HZO materials reinforced the importance of precise fabrication techniques and their implications for next-generation memory technologies.” (Dr. Gunjan Yadav)

We want to acknowledge the PEPR Diadem MicroElec project for the funding.