Plastic memory

A conducting plastic has been used to create a new memory technology

with the potential to store a megabit of data in a millimetre-square
device - 10 times denser than current magnetic memories. The device
should also be cheap and fast, but cannot be rewritten, so would only be
suitable for permanent storage.
The device sandwiches a blob of a conducting polymer called PEDOT
and a silicon diode between two perpendicular wires. Substantial
research effort has focused on polymer-based transistors, which could
form cheap, flexible circuits, but polymer-based memory has received
relatively little attention.
The key to the new technology was the discovery by researchers from
Princeton University, New Jersey, and Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in
Palo Alto, California, that passing a high current through PEDOT turns
it into an insulator, rather like blowing a fuse. The polymers two
possible states, conductor or insulator, then form the one and zero
necessary to store digital data.
"The beauty of the device is that it combines the best of silicon
technology - diodes - with the capability to form a fuse, which does not
exist in silicon," says Vladimir Bulovic, who works on organic
electronics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
However, turning the polymer INTO an insulator involves a permanent
chemical change, meaning the memory can only be written to once. Its
creators say this makes it ideal for archiving images and other data
directly from a digital camera, cellphone or PDA, like an electronic
version of film negatives.

INTRODUCTION OF PEDOT:

PEDOT's ability to conduct electricity means it is already used
widely
as the anti-static coating on camera film. But until now, no one
suspected that it could be converted into an insulator.
The material is a blend of a negatively-charged polymer called
PSSand
a positively-charged one called PEDT+. Having distinct, charged
components allows it to conduct electricity and means that it is
water
soluble.
The team is not sure why it stops conducting when high currents
pass
through. But Princeton researcher Stephen Forrest suspects that
the
heat produced by a high current gives the PSS- layer sufficient
energy
to snatch a positively-charged hydrogen ion from any water that
has
dissolved on its surface, forming a neutral PSSH.
Without the negatively-charged PSS- to stabilise it, PED+ in turn
grabs on to an extra electron and also becomes neutral,
converting
PEDOT into an insulating polymer.

The team predicts that one million bits of information could fit
into a square millimeter of material the thickness of a sheet of
paper.
A block just a cubic centimeter in size could contain as many as
1,000
high-quality digital images, the scientists suggest, and producing
it
wouldn't require high-temperatures or vacuum chambers.


Top: Conceptual view of a working device.
Application of an electrical voltage to an
individual element blows-out the small
polymer fuse, creating a 0. Re-polling of
the device records which columns are 1s
and which are 0s. Hence a simple but
effective memory is created.
Bottom: Schematic of the memory element
used in this study, employing an Aluminum
coated, flexible stainless steel substrate.
Also shown is the chemical structural













Formula of the plastic polymer, PEDOT. .



Fig 1A) Write Read
Erase cycle. A -6V pulse is
applied to bring the
memory in its written
state. Subsequently the
memory is read at -0.5V.
Further a +6V pulse is
applied to erase to
memory.


Fig 1B) A schematic
overview of a memory cell

A two-terminal device in which an organic
semiconducting polymer is sandwiched
between two electrodes, indium doped tin
oxide (ITO) and aluminum. The
experimental devices contain two polymer
layers. The first layer consist of
PEDOT:PSS to which an inorganic salt
(e.g. lithium triflate) and plasticizer
(ethylene carbonate, EC) have been added.
The second layer consists of poly(3-
hexylthiophene) (P3HT) doped with the
plasticizer. Motion of the ions present in
the device under influence of an electric
field is expected to induce switching
between a high and a low conduction state,
the so called ON and OFF state of a
memory device.