High-Density Spin–Orbit Torque Magnetic Random Access Memory With Voltage-Controlled Magnetic Anisotropy/Spin-Transfer Torque Assist

Abstract

This article explores an area saving scheme for spin–orbit torque (SOT) magnetic random access memory (MRAM) by sharing the SOT channel and write transistor among multiple magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs). We use two write mechanisms to selectively write the MTJs, i.e., voltage-controlled magnetic anisotropy (VCMA)-assisted write in the presence of an external magnetic field and field-free spin-transfer torque (STT)-assisted write. Using micromagnetic simulations that are augmented by the rare-event enhancement, we study various trade-offs among write current, time, and energy, write error rate (WER), and the number of MTJs on an SOT channel. We quantify the issue of IR drop on the SOT channel as a function of the SOT layer thickness and number of MTJs. Our results show having more than four MTJs on an SOT channel poses major challenges in terms of IR drop and WER. In addition, we evaluate the impact of the proposed scheme on read performance.

Keywords

• Magnetic random access memory (MRAM)
• spin–orbit torque (SOT)
• spin-transfer torque (STT)
• voltage-controlled magnetic anisotropy (VCMA)