Low-thermal-budget (300 °C) ferroelectric TiN/Hf0.5Zr0.5O2/TiN capacitors realized using high-pressure annealing
Si Joon Kim, Yong Chan Jung, Jaidah Mohan, Hyojeong Kim, Hyojeong Kim, Sung Min Rho, Min Seong Kim, Jeong Gyu Yoo, Hye Ryeon Park, Heber Hernandez‐Arriaga, Jin-Hyun Kim, Jin-Hyun Kim, Hyung Tae Kim, Hyung Tae Kim, Dong Hyun Choi, Joohye Jung, Su Min Hwang, Harrison Sejoon Kim, Harrison Sejoon Kim, Hyun Jae Kim, Hyun Jae Kim, Jiyoung Kim, Jiyoung Kim
Abstract
In this Letter, a high-pressure annealing (HPA) process is proposed as a way to reduce the thermal budget of Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 (HZO) thin films with ferroelectric behaviors. The low-thermal-budget process is essential for integrating ferroelectric devices in the back-end-of-line to provide more functionalities and effective memory area. For the HZO film annealed at 300 °C using the HPA process, an orthorhombic phase responsible for ferroelectric behavior was formed with a decrease in film thickness, resulting in a remanent polarization (Pr) of ∼13 μC/cm2 (i.e., 2Pr of ∼26 μC/cm2). Meanwhile, when only the annealing time was increased at 300 °C without applying pressure, the HZO film did not crystallize and exhibited linear dielectric properties. Consequently, the HZO films (<10 nm) can be crystallized by applying pressure (15 atm) even at low temperatures of 300 °C, thereby obtaining ferroelectric properties.