A low-voltage force-balanced barometric pressure sensor

Author

Gogoi, B.P. ; Mastrangelo, C.H.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Michigan Univ., Ann Arbor, MI, USA

fYear

1996

fDate

8-11 Dec. 1996

Firstpage

529

Lastpage

532

Abstract

In this paper we report the fabrication and initial testing of a low voltage force-balanced surface micromachined barometric pressure sensor. In this device, the force and deformation of a diaphragm induced by an external pressure are balanced using electrostatic forces. The design described here has a full scale pressure range of 1 atmosphere, a nominal capacitance of 0.34 pF and a full scale range of 70 fF. The pressure is balanced by voltages in the range of 15-25 volts, which proves the feasibility of developing a closed-loop pressure sensor using low-voltage electronics.

Keywords

electrostatic devices; micromachining; microsensors; pressure sensors; semiconductor device testing; 0.34 pF; 1 atm; 15 to 25 V; closed-loop pressure sensor; diaphragm deformation; diaphragm force; electrostatic force balancing; fabrication; force multiplication scheme; full scale pressure range; low-voltage electronics; low-voltage force-balanced barometric pressure sensor; surface micromachined barometric pressure sensor; testing; voltage balancing; Actuators; Capacitance; Circuit testing; Electrodes; Electrostatics; Force sensors; Manufacturing; Mechanical sensors; Sensor phenomena and characterization; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Electron Devices Meeting, 1996. IEDM '96., International

Conference_Location

San Francisco, CA, USA

ISSN

0163-1918

Print_ISBN

0-7803-3393-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IEDM.1996.585571

Filename

585571