SPINTRONIC MEMRISTORS

Franklin Geo Francis

E7B
Roll No. 14
Guide: Mr. Binesh T
Contents
• Memristors
– Origin
– Theory
• Spintronics
• Spintronic Memristors
– MTJ
– Thin Film Element
– Spin Valve
• Applications
• Advantages
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 What Are Memristors?
•A memristor is essentially a resistor with “memory”.

•It expresses the property of memristance.

•A memristor is able to hold to its last resistance value even

if the voltage has been turned off and it can retain it for a
long time.

•It is a fundamental circuit element.

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Fundamental Circuit Quantities

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 Origin Of Memristors
• Leon Chua, a professor at UC Berkley,
predicted the existence of Memristor, in 1971,
based upon symmetry arguments.
• Chua discovered a missing link in the pair wise
mathematical equations that relate the four
circuit quantities—charge, current, voltage,
and magnetic flux—to one another.

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 Theory
• The original definition of Memristor is given by

• q is the electric charge,ϕ is the magnetic flux

and M is the memristance. From Faraday’s
Law we can show that,

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• Memristance is different from ordinary
resistance in that it is charge-dependent.
• The definition of Memristor can be
generalised to

• The power consumption of a memristor is

given by

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 Current Voltage Characteristics
• Current Voltage relationship is similar to that
of a Lissajous pattern.

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 Spintronics
• Spintronics refers to the study of the role
played by electron spin, in solid state physics,
and its associated magnetic moment, in
addition to its fundamental electronic charge.
• Spin is a purely quantum phenomenon roughly
akin to the spinning of a child’s top or the
directional behavior of a compass needle. The
top could spin in the clockwise or
counterclockwise direction
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• Spin therefore lends itself elegantly to a new
kind of binary logic of ones and zeros. The
movement of spin, like the flow of charge, can
also carry information among devices.
• One advantage of spin over charge is that spin
can be easily manipulated by externally
applied magnetic fields, a property already in
use in magnetic storage technology.

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Spin Torque Induced Magnetisation
Switching
• The magnetic tunnel junction
consists of two ferromagnetic
metals, separated by an
ultrathin layer of insulator.
• The insulating layer is so thin
that electrons can tunnel
through the barrier if a bias
voltage is applied between
the two metal electrodes

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• One of the ferromagnet is called a reference
layer. It is engineered in such a way that its
magnetisation remains constant.
• The other ferromagnet is called the free layer.
Its magnetisation can be varied through Spin
Torque Induced Magnetisation.
• Spin Torque Induced Magnetisation is based
on the Conservation of Angular Momentum,
which leads to torque.

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13
 Current Induced Domain Wall Motion

• A domain wall is an interface separating

magnetic domains. It is a transition between
different magnetic moments.
• Spin-polarized electrons in a ferromagnet pass
through a domain wall, creates a torque on
the electrons tending to align their spin
magnetic moments with the magnetization
direction.

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• Conservation of angular momentum requires
a reaction torque, known as the spin transfer
torque, from the electrons to the
magnetization that displaces the domain wall
in the direction of electron flow.

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 Spintronic Memristors
• Memristors implemented using the concept of
Spintronics.
• Basically we try to control the magnetisation of a
spintronic device through current electron spin
changes.
• If the resistance of this spintronic device is
determined by its magnetization state, we could
have a spintronic memristor with its resistance
dependent upon the integral effects of its current
profile.
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Magnetic Tunnel Junction
• It consists of two layers,
the free layer and the
reference layer.
• The polarisation of the
reference layer is constant
whereas the polarisation
of free layer can be
varied.

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• MTJ resistance can be written as a function of
angle between the free-layer magnetization
direction and the pinned layer magnetization
direction

• where θ is the angle between the free layer

and reference layer, G0 is the MTJ conductance
for θ=∏/2 rads.
• TMR= (GH – GL )/ GL

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• High Conductance  Both layers parallel.
• Low Conductance  Both layers anti-parallel.

• The shapes of these I–V curves depend upon

the voltage frequencies due to the dependence
of resistance upon the historic profile of
current or voltage.

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Thin Film Element
• A thin film element with
varying width w and
thickness t.
• The current induced
domain-wall motion in
the film-length direction
x is considered.

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• The domain-wall velocity in a thin-film
element is a function of driving current
density

• where J = (I/wt) is the current density. The

driving force exerted by electrons on the
domain wall corresponds to a reaction force
applied to electrons by the domain wall, which
manifests itself as a wall resistance,

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• In the previous equation R0 is the hall
coefficient, β is a correction factor = 2 and μ is
the domain wall mobility, which scales with
the thin film aspect ratio. μ =(w/t)K.
• Thus, for a thin-film element with constant
thickness t, the domain wall resistance scales
with the element width.
• For spatially varying width,

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• Two hysteretic I–V curves at two different
voltage frequencies are shown. For thin-film
domain-wall motion, memristor effects become
significant as the driving voltage frequency is
high enough to interact with domain-wall
moving speed.
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Spin Valve
• Long spin-valve structure
with domain wall motion
in the free layer.
• The resistance depends
on domain-wall position
x: R = [(RLx/D) + (RH(D − x)/D)],
where D is the free-layer
length.

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• RL low resistance & RH high resistance .
• We assume a very sharp domain wall and ignore the
domain-wall resistance. The domain-wall velocity is
then proportional to current-density strength, e.g.,
(dx/dt) =τI.
• Thus memristance is equal to

where q is electronic charge.

• The memristor is realized by electron and spin
transport coupling
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Spintronic Memristors
Applications

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 Multi Bit Data Storage & Logic
• Two Methods
– Two horizontal domains are introduced in MTJ free
layer.
– Two MTJ are stacked vertically.
• One bit of the two bits cell is hard and requires
higher current to switch and the other bit is soft
and requires less current to switch
• Switching is achieved by varying current
magnitude.
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• We denote the first bit as hard bit and the
second bit as soft bit.

• Based upon R-I curve switching behavior; multi-

bit MTJ cell has reversible branches and
irreversible branches.
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• As a memristor, MTJ resistance switching not
only depends upon current magnitude but also
depends upon current pulse width

• The longer current pulse width switches the

soft sub-cell & shorter current pulse width
switches the hard sub-cell.
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Temperature Sensor
• Spin- Valve structure with a
free layer and a reference
layer.
• The free layer is divided by a
domain-wall into two
segments that have opposite
magnetization directions to
each other

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• Domain wall velocity increases as temperature
increases.
• A biasing voltage pulse with constant magnitude is
applied to the device. Resistance difference before
and after voltage pulse is measured. This resistance
difference is calibrated to sense temperature. 31
• Operated at a region where
its electric behavior is
sensitive to temperature
change.
• Positive feedback between
resistance and driving
strength.
• It significantly increases the
temperature sensing
margin.

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Power Management Scheme
• In Series
– E =∫VIdt =V∫Idt
– ∫Idt can be read out by
memristor resistance.
Series • In Parallel
– E = ∫VIdt = I ∫Vdt
– ∫Vdt can be read out by
memristor resistance.

Parallel 33
• Active control of power can also be achieved.
• Negative feedback between memristor
resistance and power i.e. the domain wall
moves in a direction to reduce device
resistance.
• Memristor resistance is comparable to that of
the circuit.
• As circuit power increases memristor resistor
increases and this reduces the current and
power through circuit.

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Information Security
• Here a scheme is presented for
the case that user and
administrator has the same
authority on writing and reading.
• The device used is a MTJ.
• For Writing
– High Resistance Fully Saturated(0)
– Low Resistance Partially
Saturated(1)

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• For reading we use two constant voltage
pulses
– one pulse tries to push domain wall toward high
resistance end
– other pulse tries to push domain wall toward low
resistance end
• The first is common for both the user and
admin whereas the second is specific for both
user and admin.

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• The device reports two
values for reading
– final state of the device
close to high or low
resistance state (High or
Low)
– whether device resistance
has been significantly
changed during reading
(Yes or No).

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• For hacking this system the user will have to
guess the second pulse strength. Guessing a
particular no. in a continuum range is almost
impossible.
• The user could try many different cells but the
admin needn’t necessarily use same pulse
driving strength. The admin can use a random
sequence.

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 Advantages Of Memristors
• The can function as synapses which can lead
to simulation of human brain.
• INSTANT ON computer using memristor
memories.
• Less power hungry and faster.
• Could lead to the integration of the CPU and
memory into one block.
• A single memory for all purposes.

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 Conclusion
• Just as the last century belonged to transistors
the new century could belong to memristors.
• Wide ranging applications.
• Huge opportunities in both the theoretical as
well as practical domain.

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 References
• L. O. Chua, “Memristor—The missing circuit element,” IEEE Trans. Circuit
Theory, vol. CT-18, no. 5, pp. 507–519, Sep. 1971.
• Hiro Akinaga and Hideo Ohno, “Semiconductor Spintronics”, IEEE
Transactions On Nanotechnology, Vol. 1, No. 1, March 2002
• X. Wang, Y. Chen, H. Xi, H. Li and D. Dimitrov, “Spintronic memristor
through spin torque induced magnetization motion,” IEEE Device
Letters, vol. 30, no. 3, pp. 294-297, 2009.
• X. Wang, Y. Chen, Y. Gu, H. Li, “Spintronic memristor temperature
sensor”, IEEE Electron Device Letters, Vol. 31, No. 1, January 2010.
• Spintronic Memristor Devices and Application- Xiaobin Wang, Yiran
Chen
• R. Stanley Williams, “How we found the missing memristor”, IEEE
Spectrum, December 2008, pp 25-31.

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Thank You

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