Using the temperature dependence of resonator quality factor as a thermometer

Abstract

Silicon micromechanical resonators have been designed to have a quality factor (Q) that is a strong function of temperature. This is an ideal sensor for the temperature of the resonator—it is instantaneous, consumes no power, and indicates the temperature of the resonator structure with high sensitivity. The authors present a practical implementation of an oscillator system using these resonators with a temperature resolution of better than 0.002°C. The Q(T) signal is uniquely suited for implementing feedback control of the resonator temperature, thereby stabilizing the frequency silicon micromechanical resonators and enabling their use in high-stability frequency reference applications.

Thermometry at the nanoscale

“…An interesting microthermometer was proposed by Hopcroft et al 53 The motivation for this thermometer was the need for highly accurate temperature determination in high performance resonators in order to account for the temperature dependence of the resonant frequency. The proposed solution was to use the resonator itself, by an indirect measure of the temperature dependence of its quality factor.…”

“…gallium inside CNTs 48,49 or Pb-filled ZnO nanotubes 50 ); Coulomb blockade nanothermometers from nanosized superconductor-insulator-metal tunnel junctions based on the Coulomb blockade of tunneling; 51,52 Complex structured nanothermometers from MEMS based on temperature-dependent resonator quality factor 53 or Fermilevel shift. A.…”

What is the Young's Modulus of Silicon?

“…Let us consider a recently published MEMS resonator design as an example of elasticity calculations [41], [42]. The device is a double-ended tuning fork (DETF) resonator.…”

“…In conjunction with the work described in [41] and [42], MEMS DETF resonators were fabricated on (100) silicon wafers at both 0…”

Surface dissipation in nanoelectromechanical systems: Unified description with the standard tunneling model and effects of metallic electrodes

“…The successful race for miniaturization of semiconductor technologies 2 manifests itself spectacularly in the form of nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) 3,4,5,6 , machines in the micron and submicron scale whose mechanical motion, integrated into electrical circuits, has a wealth of technological applications, including control of currents at the single-electron level 7 , single-spin detection 8 , sub-attonewton force detection 9 , mass sensing of individual molecules 10 , high-precision thermometry 11 or in-vitro single-molecule biomolecular recognition 12 .…”