Introduction to MEMS

Slides taken and/or adapted from - a seminar by dr. Cristina Bertoni - a presentation given to the GE annual meeting - slides by dr. Valeria Toffoli

MEMS: micro electro-mechanical systems

Silicon integrated circuit industry is able to produce devices in volume with

very high yield at low cost

Silicon has driven the semiconductor industry and allowed for stable

reduction in size for more than 3 decades In MEMS: Silicon technology is well-established Possibility of integration with microelectronics on a single chip The aspect of fabrication techniques of interest to MEMS is not the ability to pattern very small features but rather the range of fabrication techniques (silicon supports the most sophisticated and developed fabrication techniques of any material)

Mechanical properties of silicon

Tensile strength (= max stress)

Single-crystal Si (SCS) is almost a perfect material: dislocations in SCS<metals Materials usually deforms above yield stress and fails completely at the ultimate stress for metals ultimate stress >> yield stress for silicon yield stress ~ ultimate stress SCS exhibits no plastic deformation or creep up to 800C and so it has an intrinsic mechanical stability No fatigue failure when subject to high cyclic loads (Silicon sensors have been cycled in excess of 100 million cycles with no observed failure) Absence of plastic behavior means that resonating structures of exceedingly high Q can be made.

Yield Strength (GPa) Diamond SCS Steel Aluminium 53 >1 4.2 0.2

Young's Modulus (GPa) 1035 180 210 70

Density (g/cm3) 3.5 2.3 7.9 2.7

Thermal Conductivity (W/cm C) 20 1.6 1.0 2.4

Thermal Expansion (ppm/C) 1 2.3 12.0 25

Thermal expansion coefficient very important in packaging Remember that silicon properties depend on the direction in the crystal lattice i.e. tensors may be required.

SCS Fracture Strength > 1.0 GPa

[001]

{100}
[010]

Miller Notation Summary Convention Interpretation (hkl) Crystal plane {hkl} Equivalent planes [hkl] Crystal direction <hkl> Equivalent directions

[100]

{110}

{111}

<100> and <111> are the most common orientations used in the IC industry. In micromachining <110> wafers are used quite often as well.

Wet etching
In wet chemical etching KOH is frequently used for anisotropic etching. In KOH solution, the (111)

surface direction of silicon crystal is etched at a very low speed compared with the (110) direction. Therefore, a silicon wafer directed (100) surface can be etched by KOH etchant with 54.74 slopes. HNA (HF+HNO3+CH3COOH) is commonly used as an isotropic etchant. As the etching speed does not depend upon the crystal axis, the etched pattern

follows the isotropic direction.

A deeply doped silicon layer can be used as an etch-stop layer.

Silicon micromachining
Most MEMS fabrication techniques can be classified as either in the substrate, bulk micromachining, or above the substrate, surface micromachining.

Bulk micromachining is a fabrication technique to selectively remove substrate to create MEMS devices

Surface micromachining is a fabrication technique to deposit various films on top of the substrate (substrate as a construction base material) and selectively remove parts of deposited films to create MEMS devices

Approaches for fabrication of membranes

Membrane Etch stop layer Substrate Etch mask

Sacrificial Layer Bridge Layer Silicon Oxide Layer Silicon

IC + MEMS integration
Typical MEMS/IC integration is done by fabricating IC first MEMS is post-processed on top of IC or pre-designated MEMS area on the IC Proper IC protection is needed Post-IC process temperature cannot exceed 450C to avoid IC degradation
o o

Redistribution of dopants Inter-diffusion of materials Analog devices ADXL-50, the industry first surface micromachined accelerometer including signal conditioning on chip

Analog devices ADXL250

http://www.analog.com/library/analogDialogue/archives/30-4/acccel.html

IC + MEMS integration
MEMS-first approach developed at Sandia Labs

MEMS

CMOS

http://mems.sandia.gov/tech-info/mems-overview.html

Range of Silicon MST Structures

Cantilevers Widespread application in atomic force microscopy Biological and chemical sensors

AFM tips

Range of Silicon MST Structures

Out-of-plane hinge

Microtransmission

Micromirror

Catalytic Microsensor

3-levels device cross-section

Capacitors
Impedance of a capacitor is
V
I

ZC

j = = j C C 1

= 2 f

I =VY C =

V = jCV ZC

(I leads V by /2)

The current flowing in the circuit depends on both frequency and the value of C the higher the frequency the higher the current.

1 V = ZC I = =j I C j C I

(V lags I by /2)

Capacitors in MEMS
spring suspension thin square silicon membrane or stiff square silicon plate suspended by flexible silicon beams movable capacitor plate with area A t reference chamber (for a N2 filled capacitor r ~1)

Use a capacitor with one fixed plate and one moving plate to give a variable capacitance

C = 0 r

A t

if t << t, the sensitivity to t is

C A = 2 t t

Sensitivity is high if the plate area is large and the gap distance is narrow. However, technological factors limit both values. These factors include sensor dimensions, fabrication accuracy and reproducibility, and damping of the movement of the electrode if the gap is filled with gas or liquid. Gaseous dielectric capacitors are less sensitive to T changes than piezoresistive MEMS sensors

Examples of Capacitors in MEMS

Photograph (top) and cross sectional diagram (bottom) of Toyota capacitive pressure sensor employs bulk micromachining

Ref: www.tec.org/loyola/mems/c3 _s2.htm

Examples of Capacitors in MEMS

Cross section & block diagram (top) and photograph (bottom) of Hitachi capacitive accelerometer employs bulk micromachining
AMP = amplification PWM = pulse width modulator LPF = low-pass filter

Ref: www.tec.org/loyola/mems/c3 _s2.htm

Examples of Capacitors in MEMS

analogue or digital ASIC chip

Silicon Designs Inc (SDI) torsional accelerometer uses an electroformed nickel structure
Ref: http://www.silicondesigns.com/tech.html

Examples of MEMS capacitor sensor circuits

The electronics produces a large voltage deviation (+/- 4 volts) that is linearly proportional to the
Analogue ASIC for SDI accelerometer: it is basically a capacitance-to-voltage converter

applied acceleration. The output is measured differentially as AOP-AON .

Examples of MEMS capacitor sensor circuits

SDI accelerometer digital circuit uses the sense capacitors in a capacitance-tofrequency converter that changes the pulse density as a function of the acceleration.

The pulse density output signal consists of a series of logic pulses and the pulse rate of this signal is linearly proportional to the applied acceleration

Inductors
Impedance of an inductor is

I
Z L = j L
I = Y LV = 1 j L
where

= 2 f
L

V =j

1 V L

(I lags V by /2)

Current flowing in the circuit depends on both frequency and the value of L the higher the frequency the lower the current

V = Z L I = j L I

(V leads I by /2)

Inductors for RF MEMS

Planar inductors fabricated on substrates such as silicon suffer from many unwanted stray components that can compromise device performance. Stray capacitances tends to decrease the self-resonance while the conductivity of the substrate tends to reduce the Q-factor. Typical Q<10, fr<1GHz.

Cs

Inductors for RF MEMS

Bulk micromachined planar spiral inductor where the substrate has been locally removed from under the turns. Self-resonance fr is increased from 800MHz to 3GHz, upon substrate removal. 20-turn all-Cu air-core solenoid on Si. It reduces parasitic capacitances between metal traces and the substrate with Q of 16.7 at 2.4 GHz.

Asymmetrical twin cantilevers for single molecule detection

Sergio Carrato DEEI, University of Trieste, Trieste, Italy
Outline asymmetrical twin cantilevers detection of MW-CNTs fabrication of tunable nanometric gap selective functionalization of the gap

Asymmetrical twin cantilevers approach

We detect the mechanical crosstalk induced by the molecular link between a short driver cantilever and a longer follower one. The driver is actuated at the eigenfrequency of the follower the follower is excited through the molecular link motion is detected optically actuating force is as low as 0.5 pN with Q=10000 dsDNA is denaturated with a force of about 60 pN

Triple follower and mode splitting

Three nominally identical followers are built only the central one faces the driver

The production process causes an undercut that slightly links the three cantilevers the three resonators split their eigenfrequency into three modes

Preliminary tests with MW-CNTs

We placed MW-CNTs as test molecules across the gap by dielectrophoresis

For molecular detection we need very flat edges the twin cantilevers are cleaved along the <111> plane by an AFM tip

Gap formation and tuning

The nanometric gap is tuned by mechanically bending the whole device

Resolution is 2.2 nm/V

Spatially defined functionalization

We need to selectively bind the molecules only at the twin cantilever terminations (better if on the facing surfaces)

Proposed solution cleaving in reactive environment, with no oxidation two molecules - vynilferrocene - fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC)

Vynilferrocene solution and SEM-EDX analysis

Functionalization of the gap

FITC and fluorescence-optical microscopy analysis

They both reacts only with the freshly exposed Si <111> surfaces

I MEMS

I MEMS in campo medico

nanoTGA Cantilever con una piazzola in corrispondenza dellestremit libera. Pillar Microstrutture che oscillano attorno alla normale della superficie del wafer.

Il TGA commerciale

Vantaggi e Soluzioni proposte Tempi di riscaldamento e raffreddamento della fornace Contaminazioni tra analisi successive Sensibilit della bilancia Limpiego di un sistema di riscaldamento localizzato Realizzazione di dispositivi usa e getta Limpiego del cantilever come sistema di lettura della massa

Risultati ottenuti e sviluppi futuri

E stato testato il comportamento del dispositivo sottoposto ad una rampa di temperatura.

I Pillar