A comparison model of V- and Z-shaped electrothermal microactuators

This paper presents a novel analytical model that provides a unique guidance on the design comparison and estimation of V- and Z-shaped electrothermal microactuators. A common analytical model for both V- and Z-shaped actuators is developed for the first time in this work using the proposed topological structure layout. The developed model is verified with finite-element (FE) simulation results using commercialized software ANSYS and with reported experimental results. Finally by virtue of the benchmark and the system model, systematic performance comparison with varying parameters of V- and Z-shaped actuators are conducted to provide the essential insights into the design analysis and selection of V- and Z- shaped eletrothermal microactuators.