Resistive switching with self-rectifying behavior in Cu/SiOx/Si structure fabricated by plasma-oxidation

We report a resistive switching memory structure based on silicon wafers by employing both materials and processing fully compatible with complementary metal-oxide semiconductor technology. A SiOx nanolayer was fabricated by direct plasma-oxidation of silicon wafers at room-temperature. Resistive switching behaviors were investigated on both p- and n-Si wafers, whereas self-rectifying effect was obtained in the Cu/SiOx/n-Si structure at low-resistance state. The self-rectifying effect was explained by formation of the Schottky barrier between the as-formed Cu filament and the n-Si. These results suggest a convenient and cost-efficient technical-route to develop high-density resistive switching memory for nowadays Si-based semiconductor industry.