Soft grafting of DNA over hexagonal copper sulfide for low-power memristor switching

Green electronics, where functional organic/bio-materials that are biocompatible and easily disposable are implemented in electronic devices, have gained profound interest. DNA is the best biomolecule in existence that shows data storage capacity, in virtue of the sequential arrangement of AT and GC base pairs, analogous to the coding of binary numbers in computers. In the present work, a robust, uniform and repeatable room-temperature resistive switching in a Cu/Cu2S/DNA/Au heterojunction is demonstrated. The DNA nanostructures were anchored on the densely packed hexagonal Cu2S structures by simple electrochemical deposition. This heterostructure presents outstanding memristor behavior; the device exhibits resistive switching at a very low threshold voltage of 0.2 V and has a relatively high ON/OFF ratio of more than 102 with a good cycling stability of ∼1000 cycles and a negligible amount of variation. The justification for such a switching mechanism is also given on the basis of the energy-band diagram of the Cu2S–DNA interface. Based on the studies herein, the resistive switching is attributed to the reversible doping of DNA by Cu+ ions, leading to intrinsic trap states. Further, the switching is modeled with the help of different transport mechanisms, like Schottky-barrier emission, Poole–Frenkel emission and Fowler–Nordheim tunneling.