An efficient, electrically conductive, chemical barrier for the integration of piezoelectric Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT) films on reactive metal substrates has been developed, opening new possibilities for PZT integration on micromechanical and semiconductor devices, Very reactive zirconium films have been taken in order to test the quality of the specially designed RuO2/Cr buffer under the condition of ...

Curved micromechanical beams are a versatile platform for exploring multistable behavior, with potential applications in mechanical based logic elements and electrical and optical switches. Here we demonstrate bidirectional electrostatic actuation of a bistable, latched, micromechanical beam by the same electrode, which was used for the snap-through switching of the device. The release of the m...

A device comprised of interlinked micromechanical resonators with capacitive mixer transducers has been demonstrated to perform both low-loss frequency translation (i.e. mixing) and highly selective filtering of applied electrical input signals. In particular, successful down-conversion of radio frequency (RF) signals from 40-200MHz and subsequent filtering at a 27MHz intermediate frequency (IF...

Bacteriorhodopsin proteoliposomes were used as a model system to explore the applicability of micromechanical cantilever arrays to detect conformational changes in membrane protein patches. The three main results of our study concern: 1), reliable functionalization of micromechanical cantilever arrays with proteoliposomes using ink jet spotting; 2), successful detection of the prosthetic retina...

A mathematical theory of time-dependent dislocation mechanics of unrestricted geometric and material nonlinearity is reviewed. Within a “small deformation” setting, a suite of simplified and interesting models consisting of a nonlocal Ginzburg Landau equation, a nonlocal level set equation, and a nonlocal generalized Burgers equation is derived. In the finite deformation setting, it is shown th...

The boundary-element subregion-by-subregion (BE SBS) algorithm, developed in previous works, is employed to construct global block-diagonal preconditioners for BEM systems of equations. As the BE matrices for each BE subregion are independently assembled and stored, the block-diagonal-based preconditioners for the corresponding BE models are immediately constructed. A Krylov solver is embedded ...

The fatigue behavior of the unnotched and notched silicon carbide fiber-reinforced titanium/titanium aluminide hybrid laminated composite was investigated at room temperature. The evolution of microstructural damage and its effect on stiffness and strength degradation was quantified as a function of loading cycles and applied stress levels. Fatigue crack propagation behavior and damage mechanis...

Flapping wings provide unmatched maneuverability for flying micro-robots. Recent advances in modelling insect aerodynamics show that adequate wing rotation at the end of the stroke is essential for generating adequate flight forces. We developed a thorax structure using four bar frames combined with an extensible fan-fold wing to provide adequate wing stroke and rotation. Flow measurements on a...

This paper presents the results of an experimental study on the effect of limestone powder on the compressive strength, tensile behavior, and micromechanical parameters of a highly ductile cement composite incorporating limestone powder. Four mixtures were determined according to the replacement ratio of cement with limestone powder. A series of experiments including compressive strength, uniax...