📖 Scalable Fabrication of MEMS Resonators with Intentionally-induced Geo..

To overcome the limitation in sensitivity and resonance band of linear resonators, geometrically-induced non-linearity has been long introduced into otherwise linear micro/nano mechanical resonators. Due to serial, expensive, and time consuming fabrication processes, the idea was born in Yeom Group to present a novel geometrically induced nonlinearity design using polymeric microstructures and a method to fabricate these structures in a scalable fashion. The hypothesis of the proposed design is that polymer microstructures bridging silicon microcantilevers can support an axial stress large enough to cause a third-order dependence on the Duffing equation and thus desired nonlinear behaviors. This thesis describes how the key challenge in fabricating freestanding polymeric microstructures on top of suspended Si cantilevers were overcome as well as quality aspects in wafer-scale batch processing, thousands of the devices are produced in a single wafer with the initial manufacturing yield of around incredible 60-70%.