Cross-point memory and methods for fabrication of same

A method of fabricating a memory device, comprising:

• providing a substrate
• forming a memory cell material stack over the substrate, the memory cell including a first active material and a second active material over the first active material, wherein one of the first and second active materials comprises a storage material and the other of the first and second active materials comprises a selector material;
• patterning the memory cell material stack, wherein pattering includes:
• etching through the one of the first and second active materials of the memory cell material stack;
• forming protective liners on sidewalls of the at least one of the first and second active materials after etching through the one of the first and second active materials, wherein forming the protective liners comprises depositing and etching fluorocarbons using plasma to form a spacer structure, and wherein the protective liners comprise a conformal liner material deposited on the sidewalls, and
• further etching through the other of the first and second active materials of the memory cell material stack after forming the protective liners,
• wherein patterning the memory cell stack comprises forming a lower line stack extending in a first direction, the lower line stack comprising a first active material line over the substrate and a second active material line over the first active material line.

A method of fabricating a memory device, comprising:

• providing a substrate;
• forming a memory cell material stack over the substrate, the memory cell including a first active material and a second active material over the first active material, wherein one of the first and second active materials comprises a storage material and the other of the first and second active materials comprises a selector material;
• patterning the memory cell material stack, wherein patterning includes:
• etching through the one of the first and second active materials of the memory cell material stack;
• forming protective liners on sidewalls of the at least one of the first and second active materials after etching through the one of the first and second active materials, and
• further etching through the other of the first and second active materials of the memory cell material stack after forming the protective liners,
• wherein etching through the at least one of first and second active material defines a plurality of partially etched lines, and forming the protective liners comprises depositing a thickness between about 5% and about 25% of a width of the partially etched lines at the same vertical height.

A method of fabricating a memory device, comprising:

• providing a substrate;
• forming a memory cell material stack;
• patterning the memory cell material stack to form a memory cell structure stack, comprising:
• partially etching the memory cell material stack to form a shallow trench separating upper portions of the memory cell material stack,
• forming a protective liner material on sidewall and bottom surfaces of the shallow trench, wherein the protective liner material comprises a conformal liner material deposited on the sidewall and the bottom surfaces of the shallow trench, wherein forming the protective liners comprises depositing in a dry etch chamber using plasma,
• anisotropically etching the protective liner material to remove the protective liner material from the bottom surface of the shallow trench to form a protective liner spacer on sidewall surfaces of the upper portion, and
• further etching the memory cell material stack to separate the memory cell material stack into memory cell line stacks after forming the protective liner spacer.