A General Methodology to Predict the Reliability of Single-Crystal Silicon MEMS Devices

We describe and validate a new failure prediction methodology specifically designed for single-crystal microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) devices under general service loadings. The methodology uses experimental data efficiently generated from fracture testing of simple test specimens to calculate a series of Weibull parameters descriptive of specific surface conditions. These data, combined with finite element modeling, are used to predict the fracture probability for any MEMS device fabricated by the same processes under any type of loading. We demonstrate the accuracy of our method by comparing predicted fracture probabilities against actual fracture test results for a micromirror in two distinct multiaxial loading configurations.