A fully surface-micromachined piezoelectric accelerometer

Author

DeVoe, Don L. ; Pisano, Albert P.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Mech. Eng., California Univ., Berkeley, CA, USA

Volume

2

fYear

1997

fDate

16-19 Jun 1997

Firstpage

1205

Abstract

A micromachined piezoelectric accelerometer has been designed and fabricated using an entirely surface-micromachining-based process flow. The device consists of a 1000 μm long polysilicon cantilever structure with sputtered ZnO as the piezoelectric material. Experimental results show good linearity (<2%) over a ±25 g range. The theoretical device sensitivity and noise performance are determined and compared to actual performance. A second-generation accelerometer design is presented which offers higher sensitivity and utilizes piezoelectric force balancing in order to achieve improved dynamic range and linearity

Keywords

accelerometers; internal stresses; micromachining; microsensors; piezoelectric semiconductors; piezoelectric thin films; piezoelectric transducers; semiconductor device noise; silicon; zinc compounds; 1000 mum; Si; ZnO-Si; device sensitivity; dynamic range; linearity; noise performance; piezoelectric force balancing; piezoelectric material; polysilicon cantilever structure; residual stresses; second-generation accelerometer design; sputtered ZnO; surface-micromachined piezoelectric accelerometer; surface-micromachining-based process flow; Accelerometers; Fabrication; Linearity; Piezoelectric actuators; Piezoelectric films; Silicon; Sputter etching; Structural beams; Substrates; Zinc oxide;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Solid State Sensors and Actuators, 1997. TRANSDUCERS '97 Chicago., 1997 International Conference on

Conference_Location

Chicago, IL

Print_ISBN

0-7803-3829-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/SENSOR.1997.635423

Filename

635423