Theoretical Approach to Electroresistance in Ferroelectric Tunnel Junctions

Ferroelectric tunnel junctions (FTJs) are of keen interest for next-generation electronics. This work presents a theoretical approach to describe polarization-dependent tunneling electroresistance (TER), and to explain the controversy of the opposite signs of TER observed experimentally by various groups. The model also can be directly extended to explore possible mechanisms responsible for the memristor effect in FTJs. This work informs not only our basic understanding of these devices, but also the design of nonvolatile memory and memristor circuits based on FTJs.