MEMORY CELL COMPRISING A THIN FILM THREE-TERMINAL SWITCHING DEVICE HAVING A METAL SOURCE AND/OR DRAIN REGION

摘要

A nonvolatile memory cell comprising a switchable resistor memory element ion reservoir (212) , chalcogenide (214) , silicided top electrode (216 and 202) and a thin-film three- terminal switching device, preferably a MOSFET source/drain regions (220) , channel (224) , gate dielectric (226) , gate (228) in series. The switchable resistor memory element has the property of having at least two stable resistance states, for example a high- resistance state and a low-resistance state. It is switched between the two states, and its resistance state (and thus the data state of the cell) is sensed by providing appropriate current through the three-terminal switching device . At least one source/drain region of the switching device is not formed by a doped semiconductor region but forms a schottky contact with the channel . Preferred embodiments of the present invention include a highly dense monolithic three dimensional memory array in which multiple memory levels of such memory cells are formed above a single substrate such as a monocrystalline silicon wafer.