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TAP TIMES -42- NOVEMBER 2022
Thinnest ferroelectric material Unfortunately, conventional ferroelectric
may improve device effi ciency materials lose their internal polarization
below around a few nanometers in thick-
ness.
Lemont, Ill. — As electronic devices
become smaller and smaller, the ma- A compatibility issue
terials that power them need to be- This means they are not compatible with
come thinner and thinner. current-day silicon technology. This issue
has previously prevented the integration of
Ultrathin devices ferroelectrics into microelectronics.
Because of this, one of the key challenges
scientists face in developing next-genera- Now, however, a team of researchers from
tion energy-effi cient electronics is discov- the University of California at Berkeley
ering materials that can maintain special performing experiments at the U.S.
electronic properties at an ultrathin size. Department of Energy’s (DOE)
Argonne National Laboratory
have found a solution that si-
multaneously solves both prob-
lems by creating the thinnest
ferroelectric ever reported and
the thinnest demonstration of a
working memory on silicon.
In a study published in Science,
the research team discovered
stable ferroelectricity in an ultra-
thin layer of zirconium dioxide
A representation of a two-dimensional ferroelectric material. (UC Berkeley) just half a nanometer thick.
Advanced materials known as ferroelec- 200x thinner than a human hair
trics present a promising solution to help That’s the size of a single atomic building
lower the power consumed by the ul- block, about 200,000 times thinner than a
trasmall electronic devices found in cell human hair.
phones and computers.
The team grew this material directly on
Class of materials silicon. They found ferroelectricity emerges
Ferroelectrics — the electrical analog to in zirconium dioxide — normally a non-
ferromagnets — are a class of materials in ferroelectric material — when it is grown
which some of the atoms are arranged off - extremely thin, approximately 1-2 nm in
center, leading to a spontaneous internal thickness.
electric charge or polarization.
Notably, the ferroelectric behavior contin-
This polarization can reverse its direction ues to its near-atomic-scale thickness limit
when scientists expose the material to an of roughly half a nanometer. This funda-
external voltage. This off ers great promise mental breakthrough marks the world’s
for ultra-low-power microelectronics. thinnest ferroelectric. next page
