Study of large bending and low voltage drive electrostatic actuator with novel shaped cantilever and electrode

This paper presents the bending performance of an electrostatic actuator which has an electrode and a cantilever both with polynomial curved shapes. To investigate how to get a large deflection of a cantilever, various device structures are examined by a numerical calculation which takes into consideration large deflection formulation of a cantilever. Maximum deflections, just before a cantilever is pulled into an electrode, are evaluated. In a combination of a curved electrode and a rectangular cantilever, the applied voltage at the maximum deflection decreases at lower polynomial order of the electrode shape, while the deflection decreases. A shorter electrode gives larger deflection, while the applied voltage significantly increased. On the other hand, the modulated shaped cantilever is effective to enlarge the deflection and reduce the applied voltage, simultaneously