Development of a micro seismometer based on molecular electronic transducer technology for planetary exploration

Molecular Electronic Transducer (MET) is a recent technology applied in seismic instrumentation that proves highly beneficial to planetary seismology. MET is an electrochemical cell that senses the movement of liquid electrolyte between electrodes by converting it to the output current. Seismometers based on MET technology are attractive for planetary applications due to their high sensitivity, low noise floor, small size, lack of fragile moving parts and independence on the direction of sensitivity axis. This paper reports an approach to build a micro MET seismometer using Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) techniques. We have reduced the MET cell size, resulting in internal dimensions close to 1 micrometer (μm). The employment of MEMS improves the sensitivity up to 400V (m/s²) and reproducibility of the device, and has reached 1 micro Gee (1.0 ×10^-5 m/s²/√Hz) noise level at 1 Hz.