Major opportunities exist for optical microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and, despite recent economic setbacks for companies working in the field, concentrated research on optical MEMS is underway at many locations. Most of the research reported thus far has been focused on activated-mirror-micro-optical systems-which have instantly recognizable applications in the display and fiber-optic-sw...

The K-band microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) tunable band-pass filter, with a wide-frequency tunable range and miniature size, is able to fulfill the requirements of the multiband satellite communication systems. A novel 21.69–24.36 GHz MEMS tunable band-pass filter is designed, analyzed, fabricated and measured. This paper also designs and analyzes an inductively tuned slow-wave resonator,...

In the current communications market, there exists a great demand for devices, which function as passive signal processing units. High performance and small size are identified to be the bottlenecks to meet market demand in communications area[1,3]. MEMS or micromachining technology can yield small, low weight and high performance components to replace the currently used off-chip components. Th...

Introduction Consumer demand for highly personalized, ubiquitous access to information continues to increase rapidly. Growing volumes of data traffic and demands for higher quality products and services have driven the proliferation of new portable and fixed communications. Suppliers of wireless and wire line communications are being challenged to provide more features, bandwidth, and talk time...

This paper represents the impact of beam thickness and air gap upon the performance of cantilever MEMS switches having different beam materials (Al, Au metals). A comparative analysis of spring constant, effective mass, pull-in voltage, capacitance of cantilever based MEMS switch has been performed by 3D simulation using COMSOL Multiphysics based on Finite Element Method [FEM]. Different parame...

We discuss key features of MEMS technology which enable new functionalities of microphotonic devices, that can by summarized as “arrayability”, i.e. the ability to make massively parallel optical devices in a small form factor, “reconfigurability,” the ability to change optical properties spatially and temporaly, and “nano positioning,” the ability to position micro-scale devices with nanometer...

An experimental setup for the characterization of electromagnetic induced heat on MEMS devices undertaking high RF power regime (> 5W) is here proposed. The technique is based on infrared (IR) imaging of on-probe DUT, while it is in working conditions. The measured temperature distributions, for different working state of a RF-MEMS switch, are given. The results show that for a first considered...

Electrostatically actuated Micro-Electro-MechanicalSystems (MEMS) based micromirror is a fundamental building block for a variety of optical network applications, such as optical wavelength-selective switching, add/drop multiplexing, and optical cross-connecting. The design, analysis and testing of a 2-Dimensional (2D) electrostatically actuated torsional MEMS micromirror is presented in this p...

A novel test facility for the efficient evaluation of microelectromechanical system (MEMS) switches and the development of alternative contact materials is described. The facility utilizes the upper cantilever from commercial MEMS contact switches, and tests these against alternative bottom contact materials within a modified atomic force microscope (AFM). The test closely approximates the real...

This study demonstrates a monolithic 1 x 4 optical switch composed of planar micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) integrated with silicon nitride (SiN) waveguides. The switching motion is induced by an optimized cascaded chevron electrothermal actuator, which produces analog, precise, and large stroke for low voltages. Nanoscale displacement measurements show repeatability on the order 10 nm ...