Numerical Modeling of Heat Transfer and Phase Transition in Programming the Ovonic Unified Memory Cells

An Ovonic Unified Memory (OUM) cell is a semiconductor device that stores data by a thermally induced phase transition between polycrystalline (set) and amorphous (reset) states in a thin film of chalcogenide alloy. The small volume of active media acts as a programmable resistor switching between a high (amorphous) and low (crystalline) resistance state. The change in the film resistivity (>40X dynamic range) caused by this rapid, reversible structural change is measured to detect the state of the cell (set or reset) for read out. OUM can benefit from a simulator capable of predicting the electrical, thermal, and crystallization behavior for design and optimization, particularly at the present stage of the development. This paper reports on the efforts being made to prepare such a numerical simulator, using an existing finite element computer code as the source for thermal and electrical modeling, and a custom crystallization code for phase prediction. Heat generation in the device is by Joule heating and is achieved by passage of the electric current, which is obtained from the electrical simulation. This result appears in the heat source term of the heat transfer equation that is solved for thermal modeling. As the first attempt the Ohmic current-voltage relation was implemented successfully to simulate set and reset in a two dimensional model of OUM. Solution of the drift-diffusion equation is now underway to capture the semiconductor behavior of the I-V curve. A good progress is made however, still more works needs to be done to fully implement the drift diffusion equation.