Time-Dependent Current-Voltage Curves During The Forming Process In Unipolar Resistance Switching

We investigated the time-dependent current-voltage curves of the forming process in unipolar resistance switching. We applied triggered-voltage triangular-waveform (pulse-waveform) signals with varied sweep rate (amplitude) to Pt/SrTiOx/Pt capacitors. By investigating their temperature dependences, we found that the forming process was driven by two different mechanisms, depending on the sweep rate (amplitude) : a purely electrical dielectric breakdown and a thermally assisted dielectric breakdown. For the latter process, we observed precursory changes in the current I(t) before the forming process. By fitting the time-dependent precursory changes with I(t) = I-o -A exp (-t/tau), we suggest that the thermally activated migration of oxygen vacancies/ions could help the thermally assisted dielectric breakdown. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3552676]