Nonvolatile ferroelectric memory using selective reference cell

Abstract

A nonvolatile ferroelectric memory that reduces the number of cycles of reference cells to extend lifetime of memory. A reference cell of the memory is activated to provide a reference voltage to a sense amplifier only when the sense amplifier needs the reference voltage. The memory comprises a plurality of cells arranged in a matrix form and including memory cells and reference cells, and a plurality of sense amplifiers arranged in a row of the matrix, in which each sense amplifier compares voltages induced from a reference cell and a selected memory cell to read information stored in the selected memory cell, and in which each reference cell is activated only when both a selection signal from a column address and a word line connected to said reference cell are enabled.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.