Abstract
This paper proposes a novel capacitive liquid metal microelectromechanical system (MEMS) inclinometer sensor and introduces its design, fabrication, and signal measurement. The sensor was constructed using three-layer substrates. A conductive liquid droplet was rolled along an annular groove of the intermediate substrate to reflect angular displacement, and capacitors were used to detect the position of the droplet. The numerical simulation work provides the working principle and structural design of the sensor, and the fabrication process of the sensor was proposed. Furthermore, the static capacitance test and the dynamic signal test were designed. The sensor had a wide measurement range from ±2.12° to ±360°, and the resolution of the sensor was 0.4°. This sensor further expands the measurement range of the previous liquid droplet MEMS inclinometer sensors.
Highlights
Metal liquid droplets with high surface tension and electrical conductivity have attracted significant interest in various advanced microelectromechanical system (MEMS) sensor applications such as the droplet acceleration sensors [1], liquid touch sensors [2,3,4], and liquid droplet inclinometer sensors [5,6].Compared with solid-state beam sensors, MEMS sensors that use metal droplets as sensitive elements have the advantage of having a high resistance ability for overload [7,8,9]
The sensor consisted of an upper layer, a lower substrate, an intermediate substrate, and a mercury droplet as the sensitive element
A ring capacitor electrode and 18 array capacitor electrodes were deposited on the lower substrate through a MEMS processing process
Summary
Compared with solid-state beam sensors, MEMS sensors that use metal droplets as sensitive elements have the advantage of having a high resistance ability for overload [7,8,9]. By taking advantage of this, Park first proposed a MEMS liquid droplet inclinometer sensor with a mercury droplet as a sensitive element [11]. The diamond-shaped groove on the glass substrate provides a channel for the droplet, and the angle signals were estimated when the mercury droplet is connected to two parallel electrodes. Due to the difficult sliding of the droplet caused by the squeeze deformation of the droplet in the diamond-shaped channel, the sensor was only used in the special angle measurement (12◦ and 30◦ ). Xu proposed an improved liquid droplet inclinometer sensor, which increased the height of the channel. The droplet is only connected to the lower surface of the groove and can slide well under the action of gravity [12]
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