Flexible and fully transparent WORM memory devices based on Ag nanoparticles blended with poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate)

Abstract

Silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) blended with poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate) (EVA) were used as an active layer to fabricate flexible and fully transparent memory devices by using the spin-coating method followed by the thermal roll lamination technique with the structure of ITO/EVA:Ag NPs/ITO. The devices exhibited a non-volatile write-once-read-many-times (WORM) memory type and possessed current bi-stability with ON/OFF current ratio within the range of 104-105 at a reading voltage of +1 V. The data continuous read operations reached more than 10 h, which revealed the stability of the memory devices over a long period of time. The conduction mechanisms of the memory device could be explained by theoretical models and proposed by electron trapping at the trapping center of Ag NPs inside the EVA matrix. In addition, the memory device showed a fast response of 231 ns and was fully transparent with maximum transmittance of the device at 83.2%. Further, the devices could be operated under the bending condition of more than 0.83% strain.