Journal
JOURNAL OF MICROELECTROMECHANICAL SYSTEMS
Volume 17, Issue 3, Pages 653-667Publisher
IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC
DOI: 10.1109/JMEMS.2008.918617
Keywords
electrothermal effects; microactuators; resistance heating; scaling and materials selection; thermomechanical
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Bimaterial electrothermal actuation is a commonly employed actuation method in microsystems. This paper focuses on optimal materials selection for bimaterial structures to maximize the thermomechanical response based on electrothermal heat-transfer analysis. Competition between different modes of heat transfer in electrothermally actuated cantilever bimaterial is analyzed for structures at the microscale (10 mu m <= L <= 1 mm) using a lumped heat-capacity formulation. The choice of materials has a strong influence on the functional effectiveness and the actuation frequency even though the electromechanical efficiency is inherently small (similar to 10(-5)). Frequencies on the order of similar to 100 Hz to 15 kHz can be obtained for bimaterial structures at small scales by varying either the operating temperature range or the rate of heat dissipation. It is found that engineering alloys/metals perform better than other classes of materials for high-work high-frequency (similar to 10 kHz) actuation within achievable temperature limits.
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