CMOS-NEMS copper switches monolithically integrated using a 65 nm CMOS technology

This work demonstrates the feasibility to obtain copper nanoelectromechanical (NEMS) relays using a commercial complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology (ST 65 nm) following an intra CMOS-MEMS approach. We report experimental demonstration of contact-mode nano-electromechanical switches obtaining low operating voltage (5.5 V), good I_ON/I_OFF (10³) ratio, abrupt subthreshold swing (4.3 mV/decade) and minimum dimensions (3.50 μm × 100 nm × 180 nm, and gap of 100 nm). With these dimensions, the operable Cell area of the switch will be 3.5 μm (length) × 0.2 μm (100 nm width + 100 nm gap) = 0.7 μm² which is the smallest reported one using a top-down fabrication approach.