Abstract
Resistive switching characteristics and conducting filament formation dynamics in solid polymer electrolyte (SPE) based planar-type atomic switches, with opposing active Ag and inert Pt electrodes, have been investigated by optimizing the device configuration and experimental parameters such as the gap distance between the electrodes, the salt inclusion in the polymer matrix, and the compliance current applied in current-voltage measurements. The high ionic conductivities of SPE enabled us to make scanning electron microscopy observations of the filament formation processes in the sub-micrometer to micrometer ranges. It was found that switching behaviour and filament growth morphology depend strongly on several kinetic factors, such as the redox reaction rate at the electrode-polymer interfaces, ion mobility in the polymer matrix, electric field strength, and the reduction sites for precipitation. Different filament formations, resulting from unidirectional and dendritic growth behaviours, can be controlled by tuning specified parameters, which in turn improves the stability and performance of SPE-based devices.
Highlights
Resistive switching characteristics and conducting filament formation dynamics in solid polymer electrolyte (SPE) based planar-type atomic switches, with opposing active Ag and inert Pt electrodes, have been investigated by optimizing the device configuration and experimental parameters such as the gap distance between the electrodes, the salt inclusion in the polymer matrix, and the compliance current applied in current–voltage measurements
To summarize the above findings, the filament formation processes in PEO-based atomic switches were found to be determined by the gap distance between the electrodes, the salt inclusion in the polymer matrix, and the compliance current applied in the measurements
The resistive switching characteristics and the corresponding conducting filament growth behaviours in PEO-based atomic switches have been systematically studied in a planar device configuration under the same experimental conditions
Summary
The resistive switching phenomena that emerge in simple metal/ionic conductor/metal (MIM) structures play a key role in the development of future nonvolatile memory, neuromorphic device technologies, and so on.[1,2,3,4,5] In general, resistive switching in a thin film comprised of inorganic and organic ion conducting materials is a promising approach in the development of atomic scale memory devices, such as atomic switches, where both binary logic states and quantized conductance states can be realized by the formation and dissolution of a conducting metal filament.[6,7,8] The operation of such devices is based on the oxidation at an electrochemically active electrode (usually, Ag or Cu) interface, the subsequent migration of oxidized cations in the ion conducting medium, and the reduction of cations at the inert metal electrode (for instance, Pt or Au) interface to form a metal filament between the electrodes under electrical bias. If the gap distance was decreased to ∼1 μm, a very narrow filament, consisting of small Ag clusters, was observed to connect between the two electrodes (Fig. 5b), and a current jump to the compliance level was confirmed in the I–V plot (Fig. 5e), resulting in the forming process of the device.
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