Faster and scalable to smaller dimensions, claims Big Blue.
Faster and scalable to smaller dimensions, claims Big Blue.
Scientists from IBM, Macronix and Qimonda have published joint research predicting that emerging phase-change memory could sound the death knell for Flash.
According to the study, phase-change memory is faster than Flash and can be scaled to smaller dimensions.
This has the potential to enable future generations of high-density " non-volatile" memory devices that do not require electrical power to retain information.
By combining non-volatility with good performance and reliability, IBM suggested that phase-change technology could also enable a path towards a universal memory for mobile applications.
Working at IBM Research labs on both US coasts, the scientists designed, built and demonstrated a prototype phase-change memory device that switched more than 500 times faster than Flash while using less than one-half the power to write data into a cell.
The device's cross-section is just 3nm x 20nm in size, far smaller than Flash can be built today and equivalent to the industry's chip-making capabilities targeted for 2015.
The researchers said that the test shows that, unlike Flash, phase-change memory technology can improve as it gets smaller with Moore's Law advances.
"These results dramatically demonstrate that phase-change memory has a very bright future," said Dr. T C Chen, vice president of Science & Technology at IBM Research.
"Many expect Flash memory to encounter significant scaling limitations in the near future. Today we unveil a new phase-change memory material that has high performance even in an extremely small volume.
"This should ultimately lead to phase-change memories that will be very attractive for many applications."
The new material is a complex semiconductor alloy created in IBM's Almaden Research Center in San José, California. It was designed with the help of mathematical simulations specifically for use in phase-change memory cells.
Big Blue explained that at the heart of phase-change memory is a tiny chunk of a semiconductor alloy that can be changed rapidly between binary states.
An ordered crystalline phase has lower electrical resistance to a disordered amorphous phase with much higher electrical resistance.
Because no electrical power is required to maintain either phase of the material, the phase-change memory is non-volatile.
The material's phase is set by the amplitude and duration of an electrical pulse that heats the material.
When heated to a temperature just above melting, the alloy's energised atoms move around into random arrangements. Suddenly stopping the electrical pulse freezes the atoms into a random, amorphous phase.
Turning the pulse off more gradually, over about 10 nanoseconds, allows enough time for the atoms to rearrange themselves back into the well-ordered crystalline phase they prefer.
The new memory material is a germanium-antimony alloy to which small amounts of other elements have been added to enhance its properties.