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Flexible Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 ferroelectric thin films on polyimide with improved ferroelectricity and high flexibility

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Abstract

Flexible memory devices are promising for information storage and data processing applications in portable, wearable, and smart electronics operating under curved conditions. In this work, we realized high-performance flexible ferroelectric capacitors based on Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 (HZO) thin film by depositing a buffer layer of Al2O3 on polyimide (PI) substrates using atomic layer deposition (ALD). The flexible ferroelectric HZO films exhibit high remnant polarization (Pr) of 21 µC/cm2. Furthermore, deterioration of polarization, retention, and endurance performance was not observed even at a bending radius of 2 mm after 5,000 bending cycles. This work marks a critical step in the development of high-performance flexible HfO2-based ferroelectric memories for next-generation wearable electronic devices.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 61922083, 61804167, 61834009, 61904200, and 61821091), and in part by the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. XDB44000000).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Microelectronic Devices and Integrated Technology, Institute of Microelectronics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100029, China

    Yuting Chen, Yang Yang, Peng Yuan, Pengfei Jiang, Yuan Wang, Yannan Xu, Shuxian Lv, Yaxin Ding, Zhiwei Dang, Zhaomeng Gao, Tiancheng Gong, Yan Wang & Qing Luo

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Yuting Chen, Yang Yang, Peng Yuan, Pengfei Jiang, Yuan Wang, Yannan Xu, Shuxian Lv, Yaxin Ding, Zhiwei Dang, Zhaomeng Gao, Tiancheng Gong, Yan Wang & Qing Luo

  3. Department of Mathematics and Theories, Peng Cheng Laboratory, No.2, Xingke 1st Street, Nanshan, Shenzhen, 518000, China

    Qing Luo

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  1. Yuting Chen
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  2. Yang Yang
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  3. Peng Yuan
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  13. Qing Luo
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Correspondence to Qing Luo.

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Chen, Y., Yang, Y., Yuan, P. et al. Flexible Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 ferroelectric thin films on polyimide with improved ferroelectricity and high flexibility. Nano Res. 15, 2913–2918 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-021-3896-8

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