Three-Terminal MTJ-Based Nonvolatile Logic Circuits with Self-Terminated Writing Mechanism for Ultra-Low-Power VLSI Processor
Takahiro Hanyu1, Daisuke Suzuki2, Naoya Onizawa2 and Masanori Natsui1
1Research Institute of Electrical Communication, Tohoku University, Japan
2Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Science, Tohoku University, Japan
ABSTRACT
Magnetic-Tunnel Junction (MTJ)-based nonvolatile logic circuits have some possibility to solve the powerdissipation problem seriously focusing on the present CMOSonly-based VLSI processors. Three terminal MTJ devices are the promising candidate as nonvolatile storage device to realize such a nonvolatile logic circuit. However, its writing energy is still serious in comparison with conventional CMOS-only-based logic circuits. In this paper, a new MTJ-based nonvolatile logic circuit with self-terminated mechanism is proposed and its energy efficiency is evaluated in comparison with the corresponding previous work. In addition, some recent research topics related to MTJ-based nonvolatile logic-circuit design and its application, such as a computer-aided-design (CAD) tool considering a stochastic MTJ-switching behavior and the application to a resilient ``die-hard'' VLSI processor against sudden power-supply outage, are also demonstrated.
