Micromachined on-wafer probes

Author

Reck, Theodore J. ; Chen, Lihan ; Zhang, Chunhu ; Groppi, Christopher ; Xu, Haiyong ; Arsenovic, Alex ; Barker, N. Scott ; Lichtenberger, Arthur ; Weikle, Robert M.

Author_Institution

Charles L. Brown Dept. of Electr. Eng., Univ. of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

fYear

2010

fDate

23-28 May 2010

Firstpage

65

Lastpage

68

Abstract

A micromachined on-wafer probe is designed, fabricated and measured at W-Band as a proof of concept for probes operating at sub-millimeter wavelengths. A fabrication process is developed to create devices that combine a waveguide probe with a GSG probe tip on a 15 μm silicon substrate. This device is housed in a metal machined waveguide block that provides mechanical support for the probe and connection to a waveguide flange. Load-cell measurements show a DC contact resistance below 0.07 Ω with a force of 1 mN. A two-tier TRL calibration characterizes the operation of the electromagnetic design and an insertion loss of 1.75 dB is achieved; this is comparable with commercial probes operating in the same band.

Keywords

micromachining; silicon; substrates; waveguides; GSG probe tip; W-band; electromagnetic design; fabrication process; metal machined waveguide; micromachined on-wafer probes; silicon substrate; size 15 mum; sub-millimeter wavelength; waveguide flange; Contact resistance; Electrical resistance measurement; Electromagnetic measurements; Electromagnetic waveguides; Flanges; Force measurement; Optical device fabrication; Probes; Silicon; Wavelength measurement; CPW; On-wafer probes; micro-machining; waveguide;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Symposium Digest (MTT), 2010 IEEE MTT-S International

Conference_Location

Anaheim, CA

ISSN

0149-645X

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-6056-4

Electronic_ISBN

0149-645X

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MWSYM.2010.5517580

Filename

5517580