memory cell was not successfully programmed then second program pulse 120 having a peak amplitude higher than that of first program pulse 110 may be applied to the memory cell as before second program pulse 120 applied to the memory cell may be followed by a verify process to determine whether the memory cell was successfully programmed by program pulse 120 if so then pv bias signal 100 may no longer be applied to the memory cell e g subsequent program pulses 130 140 and so on need not be applied to the memory cell however if the memory cell was not successfully programmed then third program pulse 130 having a peak amplitude higher than that of second program pulse 120 may be applied to the memory cell such a process may continue until the program pulse is successfully programmed such a pv bias signal 100 of course may comprise a variety of characteristic shapes and or configurations and claimed subject matter is not limited in this respect fig2 is a plot showing threshold voltage distributions 200 for a population of memory cells programmed by the application of pv bias signal 100 shown in fig1 for example according to an embodiment such distributions may arise from physical variations of memory cells in an array due to usage e g program erase cycles fabrication and or location on a semiconductor wafer for example to elaborate variations in fabrication conditions from lot to lot and or from region to region on a semiconductor wafer for example may lead to variations in characteristics and or physical parameters.