Single- and double-hot arm asymmetrical polysilicon surface micromachined electrothermal microactuators applied to realize a microengine

Fabrication Process Comparison and Dynamics Evaluation of Electrothermal Actuators for a Prototype MEMS Safe and Arming Devices

“…Using this basic principle, a variety of different configurations can be made to produce actuators that are unior bi-directional and actuate laterally or vertically. 3,4,5,6,7,8 Another configuration known as a double lateral hot arm actuator works on the same principles as the single hot arm actuator, as illustrated in Fig. 4.…”

“…1,2,3,4 They have been prototyped using fabrication processes like the Polysilicon Multi-User microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) Process (PolyMUMPs®) and the Sandia Ultra-Planar, Multi-Level MEMS Technology 5 (SUMMiT V™). 5,6,7,8 In this paper, electrothermal actuators and arrays were designed and fabricated in both processes and then tested and compared. Figure 1 shows an array of ten grouped thermal actuators fabricated in the PolyMUMPs process, and Fig.…”

Thermally actuated microshutter for MOEMS applications

“…The relatively small cross-section of the hot-arm, compared to the cold-arm, generates a significant difference in the amount of thermal expansion created by Joule heating in the two arms due to the larger current density in the hot-arm. The hot-arm expands much more than the cold-arm, creating a moment on the cold-arm about the ground anchor which results in the unanchored end of the device displacing in an arch-like motion 6,7 . The flexure of the device creates a restoring force that counters the applied force at the end of the device; when power to the electrodes is removed, the device returns to its original position, allowing the device to be used repeatedly.…”

“…The flexure of the device creates a restoring force that counters the applied force at the end of the device; when power to the electrodes is removed, the device returns to its original position, allowing the device to be used repeatedly. The force is proportional to the linear deflection and, therefore, is also increased 6,7 with an increase in applied voltage. Figure 5(b) illustrates the lateral thermal actuator deflection with increasing applied voltage as modeled in CoventorWare ® for a representative 300-μm long single hot-arm device.…”

Integration of Ag2Ga nanoneedles on batch fabricated micro-grippers for material property measurement.

“…Such micro-tweezers, if removed from the substrate support, could be useful tools for manipulation but are limited by their relatively large size and large actuating voltages for nano-scale work. Electro-thermal grippers/tweezers based on silicon and polymer are also reported [16][17][18][19][20][21][22], however they need a high temperature and high driving voltages and these conditions will bring noise for measuring electrical properties of cells. Piezoelectric grippers/tweezers have also been used [23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30]; although they supply a precise actuation technique, they produce small displacements limiting their applications.…”