Phase change memory (PCM) is an important candidate for future memory devices. The crystalline phase of PCM materials contains abundant intrinsic vacancies, which plays an important role in the rapid phase transition upon memory switching. However, few experimental efforts have been invested to study these invisible entities. In this work, Au dopants are alloyed into the crystalline GeTe to fill the intrinsic Ge vacancies so that the role of these vacancies in the amorphization of GeTe can be indirectly studied. As a result, the reduction of Ge vacancies induced by Au dopants hampers the amorphization of GeTe as the activation energy of this process becomes higher. This is because the vacancy-interrupted lattice can be “repaired” by Au dopants with the recovery of bond connectivity. Our results demonstrate the importance of vacancies in the phase transition of chalcogenides, and we employ the percolation theory to explain the impact of these intrinsic defects on this vacancy-ridden crystal quantitatively....

中文翻译：

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金填充物揭示了 GeTe 相变中的空位作用

相变存储器 (PCM) 是未来存储设备的重要候选者。PCM 材料的晶相含有丰富的本征空位，这在存储器切换时的快速相变中起着重要作用。然而，很少有实验工作投入到研究这些隐形实体上。在这项工作中，Au 掺杂剂被合金化到晶体 GeTe 中以填充本征 Ge 空位，以便可以间接研究这些空位在 GeTe 非晶化中的作用。结果，随着该过程的活化能变得更高，由 Au 掺杂剂引起的 Ge 空位的减少阻碍了 GeTe 的非晶化。这是因为空位中断的晶格可以通过金掺杂剂随着键连接的恢复而“修复”。