An enhanced erase mechanism in flash memory and its implication on endurance reliability

An enhanced erase mechanism in flash memory by increasing the generation of holes via impact ionization is described. The endurance degradation associated with this erase mechanism is found to be different from those using the conventional source-side erase methods, as the better erase margin and worse program degradation are observed. The improvement of erase margin is then investigated by using a special cell structure with access to the floating gate and is explained in terms of injection efficiency of hot holes. This erase mechanism also has an impact on the data retention results due to the enhanced generation of holes.