A high-performance surface-micromachined Pirani gauge in SUMMIT V™

This paper presents a new type of surface micromachined polysilicon Pirani gauge that is designed to monitor pressure in micro packages. This gauge can measure absolute pressure from greater than 760Torr to less than 10mTorr. The gauge utilizes a double heat sink design to maximize dynamic range while maintaining adequate pressure sensitivity (∼1×10³(K/W)/Torr). A special feature of this gauge is that it achieves high performance using a widely available foundry process. This sensor can be integrated with other devices on the same substrate and packaged to measure leak rates several orders of magnitude smaller than traditional He leak testing.