Monolithic Fringe-Field-Activated Crystalline Silicon Tilting- Mirror Devices

A new approach is presented for fabricating monolithic crystalline silicon tilting-mirror MOEMS devices. The activation electrodes, etched from a thick silicon layer deposited over insulating oxide onto the top surface of an SOI wafer, are displaced from the mirrors and interact with these tilting elements via electrostatic fringing fields. In contrast to the more usual parallel-plate activation, the rotation angle saturates at high voltage. This paper discusses concept, design, and processing, and also compares modeling and measured performance of a specific 9 degree tilt range device array.