A Cantilever Accelerometer Based on Resonant Tunneling Diode

This paper presents a GaAs piezoresistive accelerometer based on the GaAs/AlAs Resonant Tunneling Diode (RTD). As the sensing unit, the resonant tunneling thin films are designed and integrated on the cantilever. In order to decrease the parasitic capacitance and control the thickness of the cantilever accurately, RTD and seismic mass are successfully fabricated by airbridge and control hole technique separately. The static pressure experiments prove that the piezoresistive coefficient of resonant tunneling device change with the bias voltage. Under 0.75 V bias voltage, the microaccelerometer shows the sensitivity of 87 ^{muVV -1 g -1} and non-linearity is less than 0.2% in the positive difference resistance region.