US Patent 7612358 - Nanochannel mem-resistor

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/7612358.html

Last year researchers at Hewlett Packard made headlines by announcing the development of a nanoscale realization of the memristor which was theoretically predicted in the 1970's and which may form a basic element for a new type of non-volatile memory called RRAM and a new type of A.I. based on physical neural networks. This patent is from Samsung and teaches an alternative nanoscale memory resistor device based on the transport of ions or nanoparticles in nanochannels. Claim 1 reads:

1. A memory device comprising:

a first electrode;

a second electrode; and

a memory layer disposed between the first and second electrodes, wherein the memory layer includes a mesoporous material and nanochannels, the nanochannels being comprised of metal nanoparticles or metal ions, and the memory layer showing bistable resistance values; and

a barrier layer disposed between the memory layer and the second electrode to control the concentration and distribution of the metal nanoparticles or metal ions in the nanochannels, wherein the barrier layer is formed on top of the nanochannels of the memory device, the barrier layer being configured such that the metal nanoparticles or metal ions can be fed into the nanochannels through the barrier layer.