Robustness and reliability of BiCMOS embedded RF-MEMS switch

Robustness and reliability of an embedded RF-MEMS switch are analyzed. Changes of key switch parameters, such as C_OFF, C_ON, and pull-in voltage, with the ambient temperature are investigated in the range of -30°C to 150°C. The biggest temperature effect, a decrease by a factor of 2 between -30°C and 150°C, is observed for C_OFF, while C_ON weakly increases by only about 6% in this temperature range. For the pull-in voltage, practically no T-effect is observed. The power handling performance is also analyzed. A DC self-actuation voltage of 20V was estimated. To hold the membrane in down position, an 1.2V DC voltage drop or 15dBm RF power was found to be necessary. Finally, a new reliability test was applied, using Laser-Doppler (LD) Vibrometry technique to analyze the change in the switch dynamic behavior after billion times of operation. The measurement results show that this behavior hardly changes for up to 50 billion times operation.