Design of a new differential silicon resonant accelerometer with dual proofmasses using two-stage microlever

A novel micromechanical silicon resonant accelerometer using a two-stage microlever and dual-proofmass architecture is presented. Based on the structural model of the accelerometer, the ANSYS simulations are performed to investigate the effects of sensitive structural parameters on the acceleration sensitivity and operating frequency of accelerometer, and the sensitivity change in response to temperature acclimation. The results show that the proposed accelerometer achieves a sensitivity of 150 Hz/g and a linear accuracy of 1.91%o with a nominal frequency of 22482 Hz in the dynamic range of ±50 g. Moreover, in addition to doubling the sensitivity, the introduced two-proofmass structure enables to cancel the lock-in phenomenon existing in a double-ended tuning fork resonator, in contrast with a monolithic proofmass structure.