TY - JOUR
T1 - An experimental and theoretical investigation of electrostatically coupled cantilever microbeams
AU - Ilyas, Saad
AU - Chappanda, Karumbaiah N.
AU - Al Hafiz, Md A.
AU - Ramini, Abdallah
AU - Younis, Mohammad I.
N1 - Funding Information:
Mohammad I. Younis received the B.S. degree in mechanical engineering from the Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, Jordan, in 1999, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in engineering mechanics from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA, USA, in 2001 and 2004, respectively. He is currently an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering with the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, and the State University of New York (SUNY), Binghamton, NY, USA. He serves as the Director of the MEMS and NEMS Characterization and Motion Laboratory. Dr. Younis is a recipient of the SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities in 2012, the National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development Award in 2009, and the Paul E. Torgersen Graduate Research Excellence Award in 2002. He holds several U.S. patents in MEMS sensors and actuators. He serves as an Associate Editor of Nonlinear Dynamics, the Journal of Computational and Nonlinear Dynamics, the Journal of Vibration and Control, and Mathematical Problems in Engineering. He has authored the book entitled MEMS Linear and Nonlinear Statics and Dynamics (Springer, 2011). He is a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
Funding Information:
This work has been supported through King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) research funds.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2016/8/15
Y1 - 2016/8/15
N2 - We present an experimental and theoretical investigation of the static and dynamic behavior of electrostatically coupled laterally actuated silicon microbeams. The coupled beam resonators are composed of two almost identical flexible cantilever beams forming the two sides of a capacitor. The experimental and theoretical analysis of the coupled system is carried out and compared against the results of beams actuated with fixed electrodes individually. The pull-in characteristics of the electrostatically coupled beams are studied, including the pull-in time. The dynamics of the coupled dual beams are explored via frequency sweeps around the neighborhood of the natural frequencies of the system for different input voltages. Good agreement is reported among the simulation results and the experimental data. The results show considerable drop in the pull-in values as compared to single microbeam resonators. The dynamics of the coupled beam resonators are demonstrated as a way to increase the bandwidth of the resonator near primary resonance as well as a way to introduce increased frequency shift, which can be promising for resonant sensing applications. Moreover the dynamic pull-in characteristics are also studied and proposed as a way to sense the shift in resonance frequency.
AB - We present an experimental and theoretical investigation of the static and dynamic behavior of electrostatically coupled laterally actuated silicon microbeams. The coupled beam resonators are composed of two almost identical flexible cantilever beams forming the two sides of a capacitor. The experimental and theoretical analysis of the coupled system is carried out and compared against the results of beams actuated with fixed electrodes individually. The pull-in characteristics of the electrostatically coupled beams are studied, including the pull-in time. The dynamics of the coupled dual beams are explored via frequency sweeps around the neighborhood of the natural frequencies of the system for different input voltages. Good agreement is reported among the simulation results and the experimental data. The results show considerable drop in the pull-in values as compared to single microbeam resonators. The dynamics of the coupled beam resonators are demonstrated as a way to increase the bandwidth of the resonator near primary resonance as well as a way to introduce increased frequency shift, which can be promising for resonant sensing applications. Moreover the dynamic pull-in characteristics are also studied and proposed as a way to sense the shift in resonance frequency.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.sna.2016.06.021
DO - 10.1016/j.sna.2016.06.021
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84976416029
VL - 247
SP - 368
EP - 378
JO - Sensors and Actuators, A: Physical
JF - Sensors and Actuators, A: Physical
SN - 0924-4247
ER -