Electric field induced avalanche breakdown and non-volatile resistive switching in the Mott Insulators AM4Q8

B. Corraze; E. Janod; L. Cario; P. Moreau; L. Lajaunie; P. Stoliar; V. Guiot; V. Dubost; J. Tranchant; S. Salmon; M.-P. Besland; V. Ta Phuoc; T. Cren; D. Roditchev; N. Stéphant; D. Troadec; M. Rozenberg

doi:10.1140/epjst/e2013-01905-1

2021 Impact factor 2.891

Special Topics

Eur. Phys. J. Special Topics 222, 1047-1056 (2013)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjst/e2013-01905-1

Regular Article

Electric field induced avalanche breakdown and non-volatile resistive switching in the Mott Insulators AM₄Q₈

B. Corraze¹^a, E. Janod¹, L. Cario¹, P. Moreau¹, L. Lajaunie¹, P. Stoliar¹^,2^,3, V. Guiot¹, V. Dubost⁴, J. Tranchant¹, S. Salmon¹, M.-P. Besland¹, V. Ta Phuoc⁵, T. Cren⁴, D. Roditchev⁴, N. Stéphant¹, D. Troadec⁶ and M. Rozenberg²^b

¹ Institut des Matériaux Jean Rouxel (IMN), Université de Nantes, CNRS, 2 rue de la Houssinière, BP. 32229, 44322 Nantes, France
² Laboratoire de Physique des Solides, CNRS UMR 8502, Université Paris Sud, Bât. 510, 91405 Orsay, France
³ ECyT, Universidad Nacional de San Martín, Irigoyen 3100, 1650 San Martín, Argentina
⁴ Institut des Nanosciences de Paris, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, CNRS UMR 7588, 4 place Jussieu, 75005 Paris, France
⁵ GREMAN, CNRS UMR 7347 Université F. Rabelais, UFR Sciences, Parc de Grandmont, 37200 Tours, France
⁶ Institut d'Electronique de Microélectronique et de Nanotechnologie, (IEMN), UMR CNRS 8520, Avenue Poincaré, PO Box 60069, 59652 Villeneuve d'Ascq Cedex, France

^a e-mail: benoit.corraze@cnrs-imn.fr
^b e-mail: rozenberg@lps.u-psud.fr

Received: 18 March 2013
Revised: 12 May 2013
Published online: 15 July 2013

Abstract

The Mott insulator compounds AM₄Q₈ exhibit a new type of volatile and non volatile resistive switchings that are of interest for RRAM application. We found that above a threshold electric field E_TH of the order of a few kV/cm these compounds undergo a volatile resistive switching based on an avalanche process. For electric field much higher than the threshold avalanche breakdown field, the resistive switching turns non volatile. Our EDXS and STEM analyses show that the non volatile resistive switching originating from the avalanche breakdown can neither be ascribed to local chemical modifications nor to a local phase change with symmetry breaking at a resolution better than a few nanometer. This is in strong contrast with non volatile resistive switching reported so far that are all based on chemical or structural changes. Conversely, our results suggest that the avalanche breakdown induce the collapse of the Mott insulating state at the local scale and the formation of a granular conductive filament formed by compressed metallic domains and expanded “superinsulating” domains.

© EDP Sciences, Springer-Verlag, 2013