Nanowerk October 6, 2020
Memristors used in a range of memory-centric technologies are driven by an externally applied potential leading to a change in electrical conductivity. The ability to look inside the memristors and understand how morphological changes characterize their function has been vital in their development. An international team of researchers (UK, USA- Perdue University) has developed a non-destructive optical spectroscopy technique that can detect the motion of a few hundred oxygen vacancies with nanometre-scale sensitivity. They constructed cavities small enough to trap light within the device. They used the tiny gap between a gold nanoparticle and a mirror and observed how the light was modified when the device was functioning correctly or breaking down. They found that nanoscale oxygen bubbles form at the surface of a strontium titanate memristor film, leading ultimately to device breakdown on cycling. The research reveals the breakdown mechanisms upon cycling and open new routes for device optimization towards large-scale technology applications…read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLE