PE2-5.5 MEMS-Based Sensors & Actuators
You can explain the working principles of micro sensors and micro actuators and describe MEMS pressure, temperature, humidity, biomedical and chemical sensors, accelerometers, gyroscopes, microgrippers and micropumps.
Sensors dominate the MEMS market and actuators are the harder half, because generating useful force at this scale is genuinely difficult — electrostatic actuation is the usual answer and it needs small gaps and high fields. The accelerometer and gyroscope pair is worth studying together since they sit in the same package in every phone and both measure inertial effects on a proof mass. Micropumps close the course by pointing at microfluidics and lab-on-a-chip, which is where much of the field's current growth is.
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Working principles of microsystems
How these devices actually work, in principle, before the catalogue below. The transduction mechanism is the thing to identify in each device that follows.
Micro sensors and micro actuators
The split between devices that measure and devices that move. Actuation at this scale is harder than sensing, which is why sensors dominate the market.
MEMS pressure sensors and temperature sensors
Two of the most common devices, and the mechanisms behind them. Pressure sensing was the field's first commercial success.
Humidity sensors
Measuring moisture at small scale, which uses a material that changes with water content. Drift and recovery time are the practical limitations.
Accelerometers and gyroscopes
The devices in every phone: one senses linear motion, the other rotation. Both use the proof mass idea, which by now should be familiar.
Biomedical sensors and chemical sensors
Devices that meet the body or a chemical environment, where biocompatibility and selectivity dominate. Packaging matters more here than anywhere else in the field.
Microgrippers
Something that grips at a scale where ordinary mechanisms cannot exist. It is a good demonstration of how different actuation is at this size.
Micropumps
Moving fluid without moving parts in the usual sense, which is what laboratory-on-a-chip needs. It closes the subject on its most active application area.
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