The miniaturization of electromechanical transducers using bulk and surface micromachining processes has enabled the deployment of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) in a variety of applications, from cell phones and ink-jet printers to drug delivery devices. A recently developed approach for the fabrication of multimaterial fiber devices presents a unique opportunity to realize MEMS in a no...

In this work, we designed a micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) device that allows simultaneous direct measurement of mechanical properties during deformation under external stress and characterization of the evolution of nanomaterial microstructure within a transmission electron microscope. This MEMS device makes it easy to establish the correlation between microstructure and mechanical pro...

Flexoelectricity is an electromechanical effect coupling polarization to strain gradients. It fundamentally differs from piezoelectricity because of its size-dependence and symmetry. Flexoelectricity is generally perceived as a small effect noticeable only at the nanoscale. Since ferroelectric ceramics have a particularly high flexoelectric coefficient, however, it may play a significant role a...

Micro-electromechanical resonators substantially exhibit bistable and hysteretic response when nonlinear characteristics appear. Badzey et al. reported that the nonlinear micro-electromechanical resonators can be used as a mechanical 1 bit memory. Based on their results, the authors propose reading and writing operations of the memory device. The reading and writing operations imply a displacem...

We study the strain state of doubly clamped VO2 nanobeam devices by dynamically probing resonant frequency of the nanoscale electromechanical device across the metal-insulator transition. Simultaneous resistance and resonance measurements indicate M1-M2 phase transition in the insulating state with a drop in resonant frequency concomitant with an increase in resistance. The resonant frequency i...

A quantum capacitance is calculated for a single wall carbon nan otube in a eld e ect device The calculation is performed on a base of a continuum model taking into account full microscopics A general ex pression for the atomistic capacitance of a nanotube of arbitrary shape is derived The result is useful for modeling of electromechanical action of a nanotube device and for nanotube electronic...

In this paper, we present an overview of recent progress in the development of the NASA Macro-Fiber Composite (MFC) piezocomposite actuator device. This will include a brief history of the development of the MFC, a description of the standard manufacturing process used to fabricate MFC actuators, and a summary of ongoing MFC electromechanical characterization testing. In addition, we describe t...