Scaling effect on the switching characteristics of a fixed-fixed beam NEM switch

Taking into account the increasing power issues arising due to scaling of feature size to nano scale regime, the design of a fixed-fixed beam geometry nano electromechanical (NEM) switch has been proposed here as a possible alternative for conventional complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) based devices. Three dimensional (3D) finite element analysis (FEA) simulation tool CoventorWare2010 has been used for the entire designing part of the electrostatically actuated switch. The device characteristics like the pull-in voltage, switching time etc. depend not only on the switch architecture and geometry specifications but also on the material used for the beam. Different combinations of the design parameters (beam thickness and air-gap) and two different beam materials based NEM switch was considered for observing the variation in pull-in voltage and switching time. In addition, the FEA simulated results of the device characteristics have been compared with the data calculated using the theoretical expressions of the same.