MTJ variation monitor-assisted adaptive MRAM write

Abstract

Spin-transfer torque random access memory (STT-RAM) and magnetoelectric random access memory (MeRAM) are promising non-volatile memory technologies. But STT-RAM and MeRAM both suffer from high write error rate due to thermal fluctuation of magnetization. Temperature and wafer-level process variation significantly exacerbate these problems. In this paper, we propose a design that adaptively selects optimized write pulse for STT-RAM and MeRAM to overcome ambient process and temperature variation. To enable the adaptive write, we design specific MTJ-based variation monitor, which precisely senses process and temperature variation. The monitor is over 10X faster, 5X more energy-efficient, and 20X smaller compared with conventional thermal monitors of similar accuracy. With adaptive write, the write latency of STT-RAM and MeRAM cache are reduced by up to 17% and 59% respectively, and application run time is improved by up to 41%.