Study Of Temperature Characteristics Of Phase Change Memory And Thermal Crosstalk In Memory Array

With the coming of information era, phase change memory has got rapid development as one of the most competitive technology of new non-volatile semiconductor memories in the recent years, challenging the dominating storage technology rely on its particular advantage. The core part of phase change memory is the storage array composed of a large number of cells. However thermal crosstalk is the bottleneck to achieve high-density phasechange memory array and there is still no effective method to measure the local temperature variation caused by thermal crosstalk. And little attention has been focused on the application of the temperature sensibility of PCM cells to measure temperature. In addition,there is little research which focused on the temperature variation in phase change memory array caused by the thermal crosstalk. This study aimed at the above issues, and is focused on the phase change memory array.The core issue in this project is to study the temperature characteristics of phase change memory and its possible application on thermal crosstalk testing. The linear temperature characteristics of PCM cells which could be used for sensorless temperature measurement based on PCM cells is investigated by modeling and experimental methods. And the simulated and experimental results have shown the strategic scheme of sensorless temperature measurement feasible. It is predicted that they could be used in real-time estimation of internal temperature of PCM arrays under operating, which shows a way to evaluate the influence of thermal crosstalk during the operating process. Based on this, a method of thermal crosstalk testing is provided. Besides,an array testing system is designed and achieved for large phase change memory arrays. Testing results are also presented.In the end, a 3D finite element model of phase change memory array is built and is used for thermal analysis of phase change memory array focusing on its thermal crosstalk at different cell dimensions. The results give the guidance to the structure design and materials option of phase change memory array.