7.1.4 Summary to: 7.1 MEMS - Products and Developments

MEMS are "Micro Electro Mechanical Systems" including also micro optics, micro fluidics and generally meaning micro systems.
MEMS comb drive
DLP chip detail
MEMS uses Si substrates and technologies because "it is there and cheap" for the non-electronic part and because electronic components can be integrated on the same chip.
Examples of high-volume MEMS products are
  • (Pressure) sensors.
  • Accelerometers.
  • Gyros
  • "Beamer" chips (DLP)

 
More products are to come; MEMS is an emerging and often an enabling technology  
Gyros are particular complex MEMS sensor products with a huge range of applications.  
There must be a physical principle behind the sensor design; different approaches can be used.  
One approach uses the Coriolis force causing detectable additional vibrations in an oscillator with two degrees of freedom if some rotation is experienced.  
         
Many MEMS devices are either sensors or actuators.    
MEMS as sensors or actuators
Looking only at mechanical MEMS, there is a need to couple mechanical movements to electrical signals and vice verse.  
Ways to do this include.
  • Capacitive coupling
  • Piezoelectric and piezoresisitive coupling.
  • Thermal coupling (expansion, resistivity changes).
  • Magnetic coupling.
  • Optical coupling.
 
There is no "ideal" coupling; all methods suffer from certain problems.  
       
   
Exercise 7.1-1
All Questions to 7.1

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© H. Föll (Semiconductor Technology - Script)