The pulse-activated piezo-NEMS shuttle relay

Nanoelectromechanical relays show the potential to beat existing CMOS technology in energy efficient computing, but fail to compete in device density [1]. A novel relay is presented as a highly scalable solution that can be used for non-volatile memory. This relay conducts through an anchorless shuttle, actuated by a combination of piezoelectric and electrostatic force, and held in contact through van der Waals surface adhesion, which makes it intrinsically nonvolatile. The relay uses pulsed piezoelectric actuation to enable stable on/off switching and relies on electrostatic actuation as a body bias to reduce actuation voltages to 10s of millivolts. A single degree of freedom model was built to simulate switching events. The pulse-activated piezo shuttle relay is uniquely scalable to a 30 nm cell size and can operate with a switching energy density of 3 fJ/μm2. The pulse-activated piezo shuttle relay is a novel NEMS switch design that offers highly scalable geometry, very low energy consumption, tunable actuation voltages, and intrinsic non-volatility.