Investigating the Performance of RF MEMS Switches

Author

Hieng Tiong Su ; Llamas-Garro, Ignacio ; Lancaster, Michael J. ; Prest, Martin ; Park, Jae-Hyoung ; Kim, Jung-Mu ; Chang-Wook Baek ; KIm, Yong-Kwcon

Author_Institution

Swinburne Univ. of Technol., Sarawak

fYear

2006

fDate

Oct. 29 2006-Dec. 1 2006

Firstpage

263

Lastpage

266

Abstract

The performance of micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) metal switches were investigated at wide temperature range. Measurements were carried out using cryogenic probe station and S-parameters were taken using a network analyser for frequencies up to 20 GHz. A total of 28 switches were evaluated. The investigation shows a 50% increase in the actuation voltage and a decrease in the percentage of operational switches as the temperature was reduced to 10 K. At room temperature the best isolation (when open) was 30 dB at 10 GHz with an insertion loss of 0.14 dB (when closed). Measurement accuracy was reduced at low temperature, however, isolations and insertion losses were similar to room temperature values.

Keywords

S-parameters; microswitches; microwave switches; RF MEMS switches; S-parameters; cryogenic probe station; frequency 10 GHz; insertion loss; isolation loss; metal switches; micro-electro-mechanical system; temperature 293 K to 298 K; Cryogenics; Frequency measurement; Insertion loss; Microelectromechanical systems; Micromechanical devices; Probes; Radiofrequency microelectromechanical systems; Scattering parameters; Switches; Temperature distribution; RF MEMS; actuation voltage; low temperatures; metal switch; reliability;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Semiconductor Electronics, 2006. ICSE '06. IEEE International Conference on

Conference_Location

Kuala Lumpur

Print_ISBN

0-7803-9730-4

Electronic_ISBN

0-7803-9731-2

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/SMELEC.2006.381061

Filename

4266611