Chinese Scientists Develop New Storage Chip Material has a Near-Infinite Lifespan

Chinese researchers have developed a new ferroelectric material promising nearly infinite lifespan for storage chips, potentially revolutionizing data centers and applications in extreme environments.

Chinese scientists have announced a groundbreaking development in the field of storage technology: a new type of ferroelectric material that could extend the lifespan of storage chips to nearly infinite levels. This advancement could significantly reduce data center costs and find applications in deep-sea exploration and aerospace.

Ferroelectric materials, known for their low power consumption and fast, lossless read/write capabilities, are essential in making storage chips. These materials rapidly switch states under an electric field, a process called polarization, which remains stable even after the field is removed. This characteristic makes them ideal for use in storage technology, sensors, and energy-harvesting devices.

However, traditional ferroelectric materials, such as lead zirconate titanate (PZT), suffer from ferroelectric fatigue. This fatigue, caused by defects in the materials, leads to performance degradation and eventual failure. When charges flow during storage and read processes, these defects move and accumulate, eventually blocking the polarization process and causing device failure.

A team led by Professor Zhong Zhicheng from the Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), along with Professor Liu Fucai from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China and Professor Li Wenwu from Fudan University, set out to tackle this issue. Their research, published in the peer-reviewed journal Science on June 7, focused on improving the material's structure to prevent fatigue.

Using AI-assisted atomic-level simulations, the team discovered that two-dimensional sliding ferroelectric materials shift as a whole during charge transfer under an electric field. This prevents the movement and accumulation of charged defects, thus avoiding fatigue. The result was a nanometre-thick two-dimensional layered material called 3R-MoS2.

Laboratory tests showed that 3R-MoS2 exhibited zero performance degradation after millions of cycles, indicating that storage devices made from this new material have no read/write limitations. In contrast, traditional ferroelectric materials like PZT allow for only tens of thousands of read/write cycles before failing.

The potential applications of this new material are vast. Storage chips made from 3R-MoS2 would be extremely durable, making them suitable for extreme environments such as aerospace and deep-sea exploration. Additionally, the material's tiny size could significantly increase storage density in large-scale applications like data centers.

This development comes in the context of ongoing technological advancements in China, particularly following the US sanctions on Chinese tech firms. In 2022, China’s leading memory chip producer, Yangtze Memory Technologies Co, was placed on the US government trade blacklist, prompting China to invest heavily in developing new technologies to replace restricted equipment. As a result, China has achieved mass production of storage chips, breaking the monopoly previously held by foreign manufacturers and dramatically reducing the price of storage chips by up to 90% over the past year.

In related research, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Cornell University have also explored the potential of multilayered materials for storage chips, focusing on boron nitride. Their findings, also published in Science on June 7, suggest that multilayered materials could offer significant advancements in storage technology.

The Chinese team's breakthrough with 3R-MoS2 marks a significant step forward in the field of storage technology, potentially reshaping the future of data storage and high-tech applications.