Novel Ferroelectric Thin Film Materials for Radiation Hard, Non-Destructive Read Out (NDRO) Non-volatile Memory

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project proposes the development of novel materials to be used in a ferroelectric FET (Field Effect Transistor) memory cell. The proposed memory cell is non-volatile utilizing a non-destructive readout,single transistor design. As a result it has unlimited endurance, very small cell size and fast read and write. The most important properties to be evaluated are dielectric constant, coercive field and memory window. Based on the determination of thesecharacteristics, the best candidate will be chosen for incorporation in a prototype product for a Phase II effortThis cell can potentially replace all existing solid state non-volatile memory such as flash EEPROM and battery backed SRAM. Due to theproliferation of such products as cell phones, digital cameras, smart cards, solid state memory cards and others this market is experiencing tremendous growth. Also, because it is fast to read and write and has a small cell size it can be used inapplications currently served by DRAM. The former market is measured in billions of dollars, while the latter is in the tens of billions.