Design and fabrication of a 3D pressure sensor

In this paper the design, fabrication and electric measurement of a 3D force/pressure sensor are presented. The capacitive technology is used for the device prototyping. The advantages of using the capacitive technology are the principle´s simplicity, the possibility measure vectorial forces via the capacitance variation which is in the range of the femto Farad. The sensor is expected to measure the force variation with a design using three capacitances Cx, Cy and Cz (for each X, Y and Z direction). A first sensor generation has been made and a first characterization work has been done. The measured capacitance at equilibrium is 0.68pF in the Z direction.