         !"#  Please cite this article as: $ %&  &   ’    ()#*+ !"#& ’*#*#!!##)),),!!"# Impact of plasma treatment on electrical properties of TiO 2 /RuO 2 based DRAM capacitor Boris Hudec 1 , Kristína Hušeková 1 , Alica Rosová 1 , Ján Šoltýs 1 , Raul Rammula 2 , Aarne Kasikov 2 , Teet Uustare 2 , Matej Mičušík 3 , Mária Omastová 3 , Jaan Aarik 2 , and Karol Fröhlich 1 1 Institute of Electrical Engineering, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Dúbravská Cesta 9, 841 04, Bratislava, Slovak Republic 2 Institute of Physics, University of Tartu, Riia 142, Tartu, 510 14, Estonia 3 Polymer Institute, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Dúbravská Cesta 9, 845 41, Bratislava, Slovak Republic E.mail: boris.hudec@savba.sk In this work, we systematically studied the influence of the plasma treatment on the structural and electrical properties of Pt/rutile.TiO 2 /RuO 2 metal.insulator.metal capacitors. The leakage current of the 12 nm thick TiO 2 dielectrics prepared by Atomic Layer Deposition was reduced below 10 .7 A/cm 2 while the Capacitance Equivalent Thickness (CET) was kept below 0.5 nm using oxygen plasma treatment of the bottom RuO 2 electrode. Reflection High Energy Electron Diffraction, Transmission Electron Microscopy, Atomic Force Microscopy and X.ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy analyses allowed conclusion that O 2 plasma smoothened the RuO 2 surface and increased its oxygen content through plasma induced surface reconstruction. The nucleation of TiO 2 on the plasma treated surface was faster while the thickness of the capacitor dead layer at the TiO 2 /RuO 2 interface was reduced. Published 4 September 2013 in Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, 46 (2013) 385304 (8pp).