Microactuators are regarded as a key component in the field of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). According to the motion of the actuator, it can be classified as an out-of-plane type or an in-plane type. Most of the existing out-of-plane thermal actuators are multi-layer structures. In this study, a novel electrothermal single-layer out-of-plane actuator is presented. The characteristics of this device are stated as follows: (1) This actuator consists of only a single thin film layer, therefore, it can prevent delaminating after a long-term operation. (2) The fabrication process is multi-user MEMS processes (MUMPs)-compatible, and it has the potential to integrate with many different micromachined components. (3) As demonstrated by the experiment, this device can be operated at a relatively low voltage. For the thermal actuator with beam length 275 μm, its deflection amplitude can reach 3.196 μm when driven at 5 V dc, and 5.316 μm when driven at 8 V dc. This structure offers the potential for application in adaptive optics systems and other optical systems. It also provides an interface to cooperate with integrated circuits and various optical elements to construct an embedded-control optical system.
Microactuator is one of the key components for the microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), and it can be categorized as out-of-plane and in-plane according to the motion types. Most of the existing out-of-plane thermal actuators are multi-layer structures. In this paper, a novel electrothermal single-layer out-of-plane actuator is provided and it characteristics and advantages of this device are stated as follows: (1) This actuator is consisted of only a single thin film material, therefore, it can prevent from delaminating after a long-term operation. Besides, owing to its symmetric geometric design, the inner-beams of this structure don’t have any current passed through them and the inner-beams also provide a geometric constraint to allow the two free ends of the structure to bend upwards symmetrically. (2) This device can be operated at a relative low voltage (<5 volt), and deflected upwards about 4 μm in the experiment test. Besides, the fabrication process is very simple and it is MUMPs(Multi-User MEMS Processes)-compatible. Presently, a prototype structure has been successfully fabricated and tested. This structure offers the potential applications in the adaptive optics systems, and Fabry-Perot filters, etc. Besides, it also provides an interface to cooperate with integrated circuits (IC) and various optical elements to construct an embedded-control optical system.
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