About the Switching Energy of a Magnetic Tunnel Junction determined by Spin-Orbit Torque and Voltage-Controlled Magnetic Anisotropy

Abstract

We demonstrate the switching of a three-terminal magnetoresistive random access memory cell based on spin-orbit torque with the support of voltage control of magnetic anisotropy and spin-transfer torque. It is shown that the critical current for switching can be reduced by about 40% due to the reduction of the magnetic anisotropy caused by a voltage applied through the magnetic tunnel junction. This leads to a reduction of 64% of the energy consumed for the input spin-orbit bias. However, it is also demonstrated that the current flowing through the magnetic tunnel junction is an additional source of energy dissipation. Therefore, a compromise between both components to minimize the total energy consumption is found. Moreover, we propose a switching energy-time product as a figure of merit for the efficiency of the switching scheme.