Porti i Pujal, MarcAvidano, M.Nafría i Maqueda, MontserratAymerich Humet, XavierCarreras, JosepGarrido Fernández, Blas2012-05-032012-05-032005-09-020021-8979https://hdl.handle.net/2445/24883In this work, we demonstrate that conductive atomic force microscopy (C-AFM) is a very powerful tool to investigate, at the nanoscale, metal-oxide-semiconductor structures with silicon nanocrystals (Si-nc) embedded in the gate oxide as memory devices. The high lateral resolution of this technique allows us to study extremely small areas ( ~ 300nm2) and, therefore, the electrical properties of a reduced number of Si-nc. C-AFM experiments have demonstrated that Si-nc enhance the gate oxide electrical conduction due to trap-assisted tunneling. On the other hand, Si-nc can act as trapping centers. The amount of charge stored in Si-nc has been estimated through the change induced in the barrier height measured from the I-V characteristics. The results show that only ~ 20% of the Si-nc are charged, demonstrating that the electrical behavior at the nanoscale is consistent with the macroscopic characterization.3 p.application/pdfeng(c) American Institute of Physics, 2005Propietats magnètiquesMicroelectrònicaEstructura electrònicaSuperfícies (Física)Interfícies (Ciències físiques)Pel·lícules finesMagnetic propertiesMicroelectronicsElectronic structureSurfaces (Physics)Interfaces (Physical sciences)Thin filmsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/article5396492012-04-20info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess