Absfract -This paper presents the design, fabrication and testing of capacitive copper RF MEMS switches with various hinge geometries, fabricated on higb-resistivity slllcon substrate. The switches were fabricated using a simple lowsost fonr-mask process and 0.6-1.0pm thick membranes were made out of sputtered copper. The capacitive airgap In between the membrane and the signal line is 1.5-2.0pm. The lowest actuation voltage measured on the fabricated switches is 9V. The measured insertion loss of a fabricated switch and its associated transmission line was 0.9dB (mainly contributed by the transmission Une itself) and the isolation was measured to be 25dB at 40GHz This paper presents low actuation voltage surfacemicromachined shunt coplanar waveguide (CPW) capacitive switches, with sputtered copper as the structural material for the switch and CPW lies, fabricated on high resistivity silicon substrate using lowtemperature IC compatible processes for modular integration in a communication platform. The use of sputtered copper as the structural material has been investigated in this work with the motivation of using the copper metal layers in a CMOS process to fabricate the second generation of these relatively small size switches on CMOS wafers. Clamped-clamped (bridge-type) and clamped-free (cantilever-type) CPW switches with membrane size of 120pmx120pm and various hinge geometries (solid and meander shaped) were fabricated using a simple four-mask low-temperature process with dry release. The measured DC and microwave characteristics of a fabricated switch are reported here.
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