A 1 mG lateral CMOS-MEMS accelerometer

Author

Luo, Hao ; Fedder, Gary K. ; Carley, L. Richard

Author_Institution

Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA, USA

fYear

2000

fDate

23-27 Jan 2000

Firstpage

502

Lastpage

507

Abstract

This paper reports a lateral CMOS-MEMS accelerometer with a measured noise floor of 1 mG/√(Hz) and a dynamic range larger than 13 G. The accelerometer is fully compatible with conventional CMOS processes enabling the integration of most of the conditioning circuits. It is fabricated in a three metal layer 0.5 μm CMOS process followed by a two-step dry etch release. An improved curl matching technique is utilized to solve the out-of-plane curl problem. A new differential amplifier is used for the capacitive sensing interface. The CMOS micromachining process used in this project is described. The design of accelerometer, system schematic applying force-balance feedback and experimental test results are presented

Keywords

CMOS integrated circuits; accelerometers; capacitive sensors; micromachining; microsensors; sputter etching; 0.5 micron; CMOS micromachining process; RIE; capacitive sensing interface; conditioning circuits; curl matching technique; differential amplifier; dynamic range; force-balance feedback; lateral CMOS-MEMS accelerometer; out-of-plane curl problem; three metal layer CMOS process; two-step dry etch release process; Accelerometers; CMOS process; Circuit noise; Differential amplifiers; Dry etching; Dynamic range; Force feedback; Integrated circuit measurements; Micromachining; Noise measurement;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Micro Electro Mechanical Systems, 2000. MEMS 2000. The Thirteenth Annual International Conference on

Conference_Location

Miyazaki

ISSN

1084-6999

Print_ISBN

0-7803-5273-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MEMSYS.2000.838568

Filename

838568