Acousto-Ferroelectric RAM -New Type of Nonvolatile Memory Device

A new paradigm for the operation principle of a ferroelectric random access memory (FeRAM) is presented. The new type of FeRAM is based on piezo-acoustic phenomena in ferroelectric films. It is called acousto-ferroelectric RAM (AFeRAM) because its operation is based on the acoustic method for detecting intrinsic remanent polarization of a ferroelectric memory cell. It has been shown that the novel memory cell concept is highly scalable, so that the structural effective memory cell size can be scaled down to IF². The advantages of the AFeRAM element are outlined in the text.