Investigation of MEMS Single Turn Meander-Shaped Silicon Carbide Piezoresistive Pressure Sensor on a Clamped Circular Diaphragm for High Pressure Harsh Environment Applications

Abstract

Silicon-based Microelectromechanical System (MEMS) pressure sensors are extensively used and have the advantages of high accuracy and miniaturization. Despite this, due to inherent material limitations, they are not easily able to withstand high temperatures greater than 150°C. To overcome this disadvantage, Silicon Carbide (SiC) is the preferred material because it has excellent thermomechanical properties and operates above 600°C. Piezoresistive pressure sensors made of Silicon Carbide are ideally able to detect pressures beyond 600°C. Our work presents MEMS Single turn meander-shaped piezoresistive pressure sensor on a circular SiC diaphragm for high pressure applications of pressure range 0–40[Formula: see text]MPa in harsh environment. This work models and analyses the piezoresistive pressure sensor characteristics using an analytical modeling and simulation method to choose the best design. To ascertain its sensitivity, expressions are computationally simulated with MATLAB software using the thin plate and small deflection theory. To evaluate the viability of the model, COMSOL Multiphysics simulation is used. When compared to recent studies, our proposed sensor provides a sensitivity of near about 5.4[Formula: see text]mV/V/MPa across a pressure range of 0–40[Formula: see text]MPa.