Although lots of works have been devoted to develop the microactuators or microstructures, few researches have been done on three-dimensional microactuators. Here the feasibility investigation on a three-dimensional electro-thermally driven long-stretch micro drive (LSMD) is proposed by integrating the LSMD and mechanical hinge mechanism. The LSMD (about 2000 μm×500μm) consists of two cascaded compliant structures in parallel. Each cascaded structure is formed by connecting several basic actuation units in series. The mechanical hinge is used to allow the LSMD to be lifted as a three-dimensional structure. One of the important issues in fabricating the three-dimensional microactuator is the conducting circuit to actuate the microactuator. Here the Ni electroplating process is used to fabricate the mechanical hinge structure and the LSMD, then the mechanical hinge itself can act as the conductive circuit easily.
From the LSMD simulation results, several design parameters are found to have significant influence on the output displacements. Larger out-stretching displacements are feasible by proper choice of design parameters. Preliminary fabrication results of nickel-made LSMD exhibit output displacement of 190 μm at input voltage of 3 volts. Fabrication results of nickel-made three-dimensional LSMD are also presented
With the demanding of handling micro objects, the development of micro-clamper has emerged. Here an electro-thermally driven micro-clamper with adjustable vertical position is proposed. This micro-clamper is consisted of an adjusting unit and a clamping unit. The adjusting unit formed by two bimorph beams in the longitudinal direction can move the clamping unit vertically. The clamping unit formed by a pair of bimorph beams at the end of the adjusting unit is in the transversal direction. Due to the residual stress difference in the bimorph beams, at initial state, the adjusting unit in the longitudinal direction will bend upward, and the other two bimorph beams will also curl up to become a clamper. When the adjusting unit is heated, the whole device will move downwards. When the clamper unit is heated, two sides of the clamping unit will open up to a waiting state. It is hoped that the capability of adjusting the clamper in vertical position will provide larger operating range for the micro-clamper. The micro-clamper proposed here is batch-fabricated by surface micromachining. The testing results show that the adjusting unit can produce 8micrometers downward displacement at input voltage of 2V and the clamping unit can be fully flattened around 5 V.
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