A One Zener Diode, One Memristor Crossbar Architecture for a Write-Time-Based PUF

With the rise of emerging technologies, nanoelectronics are seen as potential solutions for various security primitives. Memristors are of interest, as they are believed to offer benefits for use as a Physical Unclonable Function (PUF), since their non-linear behavior is inefficient to model in large quantities. A write-time-based PUF has been suggested in the form of a memristor array to avoid the sneak path problem. To amend this approach, a one Zener diode, one memristor crossbar architecture may be used. Such an architecture can virtually eliminate sneak paths in crossbars up to a size that is limited by the saturation current of the Zener diode. This approach allows uniformity and uniqueness among the crossbar, similar to a SRAM-based PUF, where the uniformity in the response is derived from the uniformity of the memory cells. Ultimately, this approach is meant as a beneficial contribution to the novel and relatively new technique of creating a random bit distribution among an array of memristors, as it allows the same technique to be used on a crossbar to offer an improvement in terms of bits per area.