Intellectual Property Law

US Patent 7340356 - Nanowire crossbar readout using resistance enhancing biasing

By blaisemouttet

RRAM is a non-volatile memory type that works based on the storage of data in the form of high or low resistance states instead of by storing charge as in flash memory. Hewlett-Packard is using rotaxane molecules between intersecting nanowires to form a nanowire crossbar RRAM memory however one of the problems is that the high or low resistance states of different crosspoints can be inconsistent during a read out operation. This patent teaches a method and system of increasing the resistance states of crossbar junctions to make read out easier. Claim 1 reads:

1. A method for determining a resistance state of a crossbar junction, the method comprising: biasing a pair of wires interconnected through the crossbar junction to determine a first signal level transmitted through the crossbar junction after biasing the pair of wires; biasing the pair of wires interconnected through the crossbar junction to increase the resistance of the crossbar junction; biasing the pair of wires interconnected through the crossbar junction to determine a second signal level transmitted through the crossbar junction after biasing the pair of wires; and outputting the resistance state of the crossbar junction based on comparing the first signal level to the second signal level.

Full post as published by TinytechIP on March 10, 2008 (boomark / email).