ZrO2 doped GeTe for aerospace applications

Varying ZrO
₂
doped GeTe phase change material of atomic percent greater than 10% were deposited and characterized. It was discovered that the crystallization of amorphous doped GeTe is suppressed by the incorporation of ZrO
₂
at lower concentration but the crystallization improves as the concentration increases as depicted by the activation energy for different concentration. Thus it resulted in an optimum concentration for highest activation energy for better stability. ZrO
₂
concentration at 11% which has the highest activation energy of 3.64 eV and crystallization temperature of 210 °C with 10 years retention of 135 °C was fabricated, tested and compared with GeTe. Doped GeTe achieved power reduction of 55% as compared to GeTe and achieved endurance of 10
⁴
cycles.