An overview of the MEMS technology development and applications is given in this paper. A special attention is paid to the RF MEMS switches. Both series and shunt MEMS switches have been considered. It is also presented a technique for modeling and design of inductively-tuned MEMS shunt switch. Some very important issues for the device maturity e.g. reliability and packaging have been addressed.

For more than two decades, intensive worldwide MEMS research and development have led to widespread applications of MEMS-based devices in consumer, industrial, and military products. Harnessing of MEMS technology enabled the birth of pressure sensors, accelerometers, gyroscopes, print heads, optical switches for rapid communications and, recently, the bio-chips for life science applications. Su...

BACKGROUND An often-used tool to measure adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) is the Medication Event Monitoring System (MEMS), an electronic pill-cap that registers date and time of pill-bottle openings. Despite its strengths, MEMS-data can be compromised by inaccurate use and acceptability problems due to its design. These barriers remain, however, to be investigated in resource-limited ...

in this paper, an adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (anfis) based control is proposed for the tracking of a micro-electro mechanical systems (mems) gyroscope sensor. the anfis is used to train parameters of the controller for tracking a desired trajectory. numerical simulations for a mems gyroscope are looked into to check the effectiveness of the anfis control scheme. it proves that the sy...

In this paper we develop a numerical procedure using finite element and augmented Lagrangian meth-ods that simulates electro-mechanical pull-in states of both cantilever and fixed beams in microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) switches. We devise the augmented Lagrangian methods for the well-known Euler-Bernoulli beam equation which also takes into consideration of the fringing effect of electr...

In this paper, a model for MEMS capacitive microphone is presented for integrated circuits.  The microphone has a diaphragm thickness of 1 μm, 0.5 × 0.5 mm2 dimension, and an air gap of 1.0 μm. Using the analytical and simulation results, the important features of MEMS capacitive microphone such as pull-in voltage and sensitivity are obtained 3.8v and 6.916 mV/Pa, respectively while there is no...

Silex Microsystems, a pure play MEMS foundry, offers a high density through silicon via technology that enables MEMS designs with significantly reduced form factor. The Through Silicon Via (TSV) process developed by Silex offers sub 50 μm pitch for through wafer connections in up to 600 μm thick substrates. Silex via process enables “all silicon” MEMS designs and true "Wafer Level Packaging" fe...

Micromachining and micro-electromechanical system (MEMS) technologies can be used to produce complex structures, devices and systems on the scale of micrometers. Initially micromachining techniques were borrowed directly from the integrated circuit (IC) industry, but now many unique MEMS-specific micromachining processes are being developed. In MEMS, a wide variety of transduction mechanisms ca...

RF/microwave MEMS technology. Part one begins with a brief discussion of RF/microwave system requirements, and then introduces the enabling potentialities of the MEMS arsenal to meet these requirements. In particular, MEMS fabrication techniques are addressed, and fundamental components, including inductors, varactors, resonators and transmission lines, as well as the design/ CAD paradigm, are ...

MEMS components by their very nature have different and unique failure mechanisms than their macroscopic counterparts. This paper discusses failure mechanisms observed in various MEMS components and technologies. MEMS devices fabricated using bulk and surface micromachining process technologies are emphasized.