Back to results
US 6,314,016 B1Granted
Sequential circuits using ferroelectrics and semiconductor devices using the same
AssigneeRohm Co., Ltd.
InventorHidemi Takasu
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Loading patent…
Loading patent…
AssigneeRohm Co., Ltd.
InventorHidemi Takasu
Estimating the term…
It is an object of the present invention to provide a sequential circuit having nonvolatile characteristics capable of holding data therein even when the power supply is shut-off. An inverter circuit INV1 is formed by replacing a pair of transistors consisting the conventional CMOS inverters with transistors NT and PT both having an MFMIS structure. A polarization state corresponding to an ON state is held in a ferroelectric layer 32 of the transistor NT even when the power supply thereof is shut off, and another polarization state corresponding to an OFF state is held in a ferroelectric layer 32 of the transistor PT. The transistors NT and PT are turned into ON and OFF state respectively according to the polarization states held in their ferroelectric layers 32 when the power supply is turned ON again. In this way, the inverter circuit INV1 recovers its state to the state right before the shut-off by turning the power supply into the ON state again.
A sequential circuit having a gate portion for switching input data according to a gate control signal provided thereto, the sequential circuit outputting a signal corresponding to the input data as output data when the gate portion is in an ON-state, the sequential circuit holding input data which is inputted substantially at right before an OFF-state of the gate portion while outputting a signal corresponding to the input data held therein as output data when the gate portion is in the OFF-state, the sequential circuit comprising:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.