Design and fabrication of a novel silicon probe for micromachined surface profilers

In this paper, a novel single crystal silicon probe for micromechanical surface profilers is presented, which uses a double-ended tuning fork (DETF) resonator as the displacement-sensing element. The frequency shift of the DETF caused by the induced axial stress is directly proportional to the displacement input. One or two stages micro-leverage mechanisms are introduced for force amplification to increase the overall sensitivity. The ANSYS simulation results depict the resonator has a nominal resonant frequency of 56 kHz under atmosphere at room temperature. The overall sensitivity is over 330Hz/μm. The probe is fabricated through a standard silicon-on-glass process with device thickness of 45 μm.