Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft Zur Foerderung Der Angewandten Forschung E.V.

Sony Corporation

Technische Univeristaet Chemnitz

Steffen Kurth

Thomas Gessner

Christian Kaufmann

Koichi Ikeda

Akira Akiba

Andreas Bertz

Joerg Froemel

Karla Hiller

Wolfram Doetzel

Stefan Leidich

Markus Nowack

Dirk Tenholte

Sven Haas

Sven Voigt

Akiba Akira

Marco Meinig

Jörg Frömel

An electrostatically actuated micro-mechanical switching device with movable elements formed in the bulk of a substrate for closing and releasing at least one Ohmic contact by a horizontal movement of the movable elements in a plane of the substrate. The switching device has a drive with comb-shaped electrodes including fixed driving electrodes and movable electrodes. A movable push rod is mechanically connected with the movable electrodes, extends through the electrodes, has a movable contact element at one side, and at least one restoring spring. A signal line has two parts interrupted by a gap. The micro-mechanical switching device is in shunt-configuration with low loss, high isolation in a wide frequency range, low switching time at low actuation voltage and sufficient reliability. The line impedance of the signal line and its variation is as small as possible. The switching device is in shunt-configuration for closing and releasing the Ohmic contact between a ground line and the signal line. The contact element has a movable contact beam extending at least partially opposite to the signal line and being electrically and mechanically connected to both parts of the signal line, respectively. The ground line is formed with a contact bar that leads through the gap of the signal line for forming the Ohmic contact between the contact beam and the ground line. A contact metallization is provided at least on top and on the side walls of the contact beam, of the signal line and of the ground line.

Electrostatically actuated micro-mechanical switching device

The invention relates to a sensor element for pressure measurement, having a substrate () and at least one mass element (), which is arranged spaced apart from the substrate () and is connected in an oscillating manner to the substrate () and/or a support body () fixed relative to the substrate (), so that a gap is formed between the mass element () and the substrate (), the width of which can be varied through oscillations of the mass element (). At least one recess and/or at least one bushing () is located in the surface of the substrate () delimiting the gap, which recess is used for reducing the damping of the oscillation of the mass element through the gas or plasma surrounding the mass element (). The sensor element is used in particular in pressure sensors for measuring pressures in the vacuum range. Through the use of the sensor element according to the invention as a pressure sensor, maximum pressures up to the range of atmospheric air pressure can be recorded. The lowest pressures to be determined are in the range of 10mbar.

MEMS vacuum sensor based on the friction principle

Growing community of inventors

Thalheim, Germany

Steffen Kurth