A single-crystal silicon DC-40 GHz RF MEMS switch

Abstract

This paper presents a new DC-40 GHz RF MEMS switch whose moving part is made of single-crystal silicon (SCS). Unlike thin-film metals commonly employed in RF MEMS switches, SCS is essentially defect-free, has well known and repeatable material properties and is virtually stress free. This makes the switch design insensitive to process variations and amenable to high-yield manufacturing. Measured RF switches exhibit an on state insertion loss of less than 0.3 dB and an off state isolation of higher than 30 dB up to 40 GHz. Measured switching time is less than 4 us.

Hybrid RF-MEMS Switches Realized in SOI Wafers by Bulk Micromachining

“…These performances are comparable with the state-of-the-art RF performance of MEMS switches [23], [26], [27].…”

“…15. The actuation voltage and switching time of the RF switch presented in this paper are high when compared with state-of-the-art switches [26], [27].…”

“…While the Berkeley switches are based on polysilicon bridges, the Seoul and Omron switches are based on thick singlecrystal silicon membranes and are fabricated using silicon-oninsulator (SOI) wafers. Other switch design concepts involve micromachining of single-crystalline silicon, monolithic with the microwave wafer, as presented by Fujitsu [18] and Purdue University [27].…”

Molybdenum disulfide dc contact MEMS shunt switch

“…Figure 5 shows the measured I-V curves of two different few-layer MoS 2 switches (5 and 8 nm in thickness, respectively). The pull-in voltages of the first switch are 4.5, 4.8, 4.6 V, respectively, and the pull-in voltages of the second switch are 8.4, 8.9, 8.2 V, respectively, much smaller than the pull-in voltages of regular silicon MEMS switches [38,39]. The three measured pull-in voltage values of each switch are very close, so they have good repeatability within the first few circles.…”

Real-time monitoring of contact behavior of RF MEMS switches with a very low power CMOS capacitive sensor interface

“…A modified version of a previously reported [4] single-crystal-silicon (SCS) cantilever MEMS switch with gold-to-gold contacts is employed as a vehicle to demonstrate the methodology. SCS offers an ideal mechanical material for MEMS devices as it is nearly free of material defects and residual stress that may negatively affect the reliability and yield of typical MEMS switches based on thin-film metals.…”