Kinetic Monte Carlo simulation of resistive switching and filament growth in electrochemical RRAMs

In recent years, Resistive Random Access Memory (RRAM) has received attention as a promising candidate for scaled memories [1]. An atomic-scale simulation tool that can describe the dynamics of RRAM operation is still lacking. Using a two dimensional (2D) Kinetic Monte Carlo (KMC) method, we have simulated the switching I–V characteristic and related filament morphology of electrochemical metallic (ECM) type RRAMs. These are considered promising for both memory and configurable logic applications due to their low-power switching and very low resistance on-state. As a result, an understanding of the underlying physics and dependencies is particularly important. In our simulation, because most important physical and chemical processes, such as oxidation, reduction, metal crystallization, ion adsorption, desorption and transportation have been taken into account, the simulated I–V curve accurately shows all the typical RRAM SET stage behaviors, including the filament overgrowth effect.