Lorentz-tail engineering toward over 10-year data retention with minimum loss in ferroelectric HZO

As the annual volume of data production exceeds tens of zettabytes, there is increasing interest in developing non-volatile materials for next-generation memory technologies. Among them, HfO₂-based fluorite-structured ferroelectrics have emerged as leading candidates due to their ability to maintain ferroelectric properties even at thicknesses below 10 nm and their compatibility with conventional complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) processes. However, the inherently large depolarisation field induced by the ultra-thin film nature makes it challenging to achieve the over 10-year data retention required for practical memory applications. In this study, we identify that retention degradation originates from the tail region of the polarisation switching distribution and demonstrate that Lorentz-tail engineering can substantially enhance retention performance. Accelerated retention tests show that the engineered ferroelectric HZO retains over 93% of its polarisation after a projected 10 years, thus contributing to the advancement of HfO₂-based ferroelectrics for memory device applications.