Study of the Effect of Optical Illumination on Resistive Switching in ZrO 2 (Y) Films with Au Nanoparticles by Tunneling Atomic Force Microscopy

— The effect of optical illumination on the resistive switching in ultrathin (~4 nm) ZrO 2 (Y) films with embedded single-layer Au nanoparticle arrays 2–3 nm in size is studied via tunneling atomic force microscopy. The ZrO 2 (Y) films with Au nanoparticles are grown by layerwise magnetron deposition onto glass substrates with a conductive indium-tin-oxide sublayer, followed by annealing at 450°C. An increase in hysteresis due to bipolar resistive switching in the ZrO 2 (Y) films is observed on the cyclic current–voltage curves of the microscope probe-to-sample contact. The effect is found to manifest itself in a dense Au nanoparticle array (~660 nm) when the contact area is photoexcited through a transparent substrate exposed to the radiation of a semiconductor laser at the plasmon-resonance wavelength. The effect is attributed to the photon-assisted field emission of electrons from Au nanoparticles to the conduction band of ZrO 2 (Y) in a strong electric field between the microscope probe and the indium-tin-oxide substrate under plasmon-resonance conditions.