Guest Editorial Emerging Memories—Technology, Architecture and Applications (First Issue)

In recent nodes the technology scaling has been slow and affects on chip memories such as Static Random Access Memories (SRAMs). They have the smallest dimension and besides leakage they are also prone to process and environmental variation. Embedded and off-chip memory e.g., Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) suffers from standby power and scalability challenges. Emerging memory technologies have brought a lot of excitement to the design community because they are not only dense but are also scalable and energy-efficient. They also possess several interesting properties that are desirable for wide spectrum of applications. Nevertheless, designing systems using emerging memories requires innovations in technology, circuits/systems and applications to exploit the preferable features while suppressing the limitations. A corresponding paradigm shift in the design methodology is also required to break the conventional mindset of limiting the usage of memories only for storage. This special issue covers the latest trends in embedded as well as standalone memory design from technology all the way to systems and applications. The specific message is to motivate the readers to think of emerging memories as foundational blocks for storage as well as non-storage areas including search, non-Boolean computation, data analytics, recognition, neuromorphic computing and so on.