Microscale liquid-metal switches - A review

IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics

Volumn 56, Issue 4, 2009, Pages 1314-1330

  Sen, Prosenjit ^a   Kim, Chang Jin ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

Liquid metal (LM); Mercury switch; Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) switch; Microswitch; Reliability of microswitch

Indexed keywords

FLEXURAL ELEMENTS; MERCURY SWITCH; MICRO-ELECTRO MECHANICAL SYSTEMS; MICRO-SCALE; MICROELECTROMECHANICAL SYSTEMS (MEMS) SWITCH; MICROSCALE LIQUIDS; MICROSWITCH; SOLID CONTACTS; SOLID-SOLID CONTACTS; TYPICAL DESIGNS;

COMPOSITE MICROMECHANICS; ELECTRIC SWITCHGEAR; LIQUID METALS; MECHATRONICS; MEMS; MERCURY (METAL); METALS; MICROELECTROMECHANICAL DEVICES; RELIABILITY; SWITCHES;

LAGRANGE MULTIPLIERS;

EID: 65549086672     PISSN: 02780046     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1109/TIE.2008.2006954     Document Type: Review

References (65)

1. J. Breickner, "A mercury relay which operates in any plane," in Proc. 17th Annu. Nat. Relay Conf., Stillwater, OK, Apr. 1969, pp. 23.1-23.9.
2. W. A. Schilling, "Have you tried switching with mercury films?" Microwaves, vol. 11, no. 2, pp. 46-48, Feb. 1972.
3. J. E. Bennett, M. P. van der Wielen, W. E. Asbell, and M. R. Pinnel, "Prevention of bridging failure in mercury switches," IEEE Trans. Parts, Hybrids, Packag., vol. PHP-12, no. 4, pp. 380-387, Dec. 1976.
4. B. Mitchell, Ed., "Low cost mercury relay means more applications," in Electronic Engineering, London, U.K.: Morgan-Grampian Publishers Limited, Aug. 1972.
5. J. Andrews, "Random sampling oscilloscope for the observation of mercury switch closure transition times," IEEE Trans. Instrum. Meas. vol. IM-22, no. 4, pp. 375-381, Dec. 1973.
6. K. Anderson, Ed., "Squeeze works for mercury switches," in Electronics, New York: McGraw-Hill, Nov. 1974.
7. J. Simon, "A liquid filled microrelay with a moving mercury micro-drop," Ph.D. dissertation, Univ. California (UCLA), Los Angeles, CA, 1997.
8. J. Fletcher, "Developments in mercury film switching," Electron. Compon. (GB), vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 46-48, Feb. 1972.
9. K. Petersen, "Silicon as a mechanical material," Proc. IEEE, vol. 70, no. 5, pp. 420-457, May 1982.
10. K. E. Petersen, "Micromechanical membrane switches on silicon," IBM J. Res. Develop., vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 376-385, 1979.
11. R. Chan, R. Lesnick, D. Becher, and M. Feng, "Low-actuation voltage RF MEMS shunt switch with cold switching lifetime of seven billion cycles," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 12, no. 5, pp. 713-719, Oct. 2003.
12. G. M. Rebeiz, "RF MEMS switches: Status of the technology," in Proc. Int. Conf. Solid-State Sens., Actuators, Microsyst., Boston, MA, Jun. 2003, pp. 1726-1729.
13. J. Qui, "An electrothermally-actuated bistable MEMS relay for power applications," Ph.D. dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA, 2003.
14. Y. Wang, Z. Li, D. T. McCormick, and N. C. Tien, "A micromachined RF microrelay with electrothermal actuation," Sens. Actuators A, Phys. vol. 103, no. 1/2, pp. 231-236, Jan. 2003.
15. Y. Wang, Z. Li, D. T. McCormick, and N. C. Tien, "Low-voltage lateral-contact microrelays for RF applications," in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Las Vegas, NV, Jan. 2002, pp. 645-648.
16. D. Hyman and M. Mehregany, "Contact physics of gold microcontacts for MEMS switches," IEEE Trans. Compon. Packag. Technol., vol. 22, no. 3, pp. 357-364, Sep. 1999.
17. W. P. Taylor, O. Brand, and M. G. Allen, "Fully integrated magnetically actuated micromachined relays," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 181-191, Jun. 1998.
18. J. Maciel, S. Majumder, R. Morrison, and J. Lampen, "Lifetime characteristics of ohmic MEMS switches," in Proc. SPIE, Bellingham, WA, 2004, pp. 9-14.
19. G. M. Rebeiz, RF MEMS Theory, Design, and Technology, 1st ed. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Interscience, 2003.
20. S. Melle, F. Flourens, D. Dubuc, K. Grenier, P. Pons, J. L. Muraro, Y. Segui, and R. Plana, "Investigation of dielectric degradation of microwave capacitive microswitches," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Maastricht, The Netherlands, Jan. 2004, pp. 141-144.
21. D. A. Czaplewski, C. W. Dyck, H. Sumali, J. E. Massad, J. D. Kuppers, I. Reines, W. D. Cowan, and C. P. Tigges, "A soft-landing waveform for actuation of a single-pole single-throw ohmic RF MEMS switch," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 15, no. 6, pp. 1586-1594, Dec. 2006.
22. J. L. Norrby, "Why is mercury liquid? Or, why do relativistic effects not get into chemistry textbooks?" J. Chem. Educ., vol. 68, pp. 110-114, 1991.
23. D. R. Ledi, CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 88th ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2007-2008.
24. T. G. Winter, "The evaporation of a drop of mercury," Amer. J. Phys., vol. 71, no. 8, pp. 783-786, Feb. 2003.
25. A. K. Furr, CRC Handbook of Laboratory Safety, 5th ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2000.
26. T. D. Truong, "Selective deposition of micro scale liquid gallium alloy droplets," M.S. thesis, Univ. California, (UCLA), Los Angeles, CA, 2000.
27. L. T. Taylor, J. Rancourt, and C. V. Perry, "Electrical switches and sensors which use a non-toxic liquid metal composition," U.S. Patent 5 478 978, Dec. 26, 1995.
28. J. S. Hsu, "Two-stage eutectic metal brushes," United States 20070152533, Jul. 5, 2007.
29. Material Safety Data Sheet for Galinstan, Geratherm Medical, Geschwenda, Germany, 2004.
30. C. Guminski, Z. Galus, and C. Hirayama, Solubility Data Series-Metals in Mercury, 1st ed. Oxford, U.K.: Pergamon, 1986.
31. C. Guminski, "Selected properties of simple amalgams," J. Mater. Sci., vol. 24, no. 8, pp. 2661-2676, Aug. 1989.
32. C. Guminski, "Solubility of metals in liquid low-melting metals," Zeitschrift Fuer Metallkunde, vol. 81, no. 2, pp. 105-110, 1990.
33. R. N. Lyon, Liquid Metals Handbook. Washington, D.C.: Atomic Energy Comm., Dept. Navy, 1952.
34. I. A. Sheka, I. S. Chaus, and T. T. Mityureva, The Chemistry of Gallium. New York: Elsevier, 1966.
35. S. Saffer, J. Simon, and C.-J. Kim, "Mercury-contact switching with gap-closing microcantilever," in Proc. Micromachined Devices Compon. II, Austin, TX, Oct. 1996, pp. 204-209.
36. L. Latorre, J. Kim, J. Lee, P.-P. de Guzman, H. J. Lee, P. Nouet, and C.-J. Kim, "Electrostatic actuation of microscale liquid-metal droplets," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 11, no. 4, pp. 302-308, Aug. 2002.
37. J. Kim, "Movement of liquid metal and aqueous solution on micro- and nano-engineered non-wetting surfaces," Ph.D. dissertation, Univ. California, Los Angeles, CA, 2003.
38. Z. Wan, H. Zeng, and A. Feinerman, "Area-tunable micromirror based on electrowetting actuation of liquid-metal droplets," Appl. Phys. Lett., vol. 89, no. 20, p. 201 107, Nov. 2006.
39. A. Cao, P. Yuen, and L. Lin, "Microrelays with bidirectional electrothermal electromagnetic actuators and liquid metal wetted contacts," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 700-708, Jun. 2007.
40. S. M. Saffer, "Formation of mercury micro-drop arrays and polysilicon microrelays with a stationary mercury contact," M.S. thesis, Univ. California, Los Angeles, CA, 1997.
41. J. Simon, S. Saffer, F. Sherman, and C.-J. Kim, "Lateral polysilicon microrelays with a mercury microdrop contact," IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 45, no. 6, pp. 854-860, Dec. 1998.
42. R. Legtenberg, E. Berenschot, M. Elwenspoek, and J. Fluitman, "Electrostatic curved electrode actuators," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Jan./Feb. 1995, pp. 37-42.
43. A. Cao, J. B. Kim, and L. Lin, "Bi-directional electrothermal electromagnetic actuator," J. Micromech. Microeng., vol. 17, no. 5, pp. 975-982, May 2007.
44. A. Cao, P. Yuen, and L. Lin, "Bi-directional micro relays with liquid-metal wetted contacts," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Miami, FL, Jan. 2005, pp. 371-374.
45. S. Majumder, N. E. McGruer, G. G. Adams, A. Zavracky, P. M. Zavracky, R. H. Morrison, and J. Krim, "Study of contacts in an electrostatically actuated microswitch," in Proc. IEEE Holm Conf. Elect. Contacts, Arlington, VA, Oct. 1998, pp. 127-132.
46. R. S. Timsit, "The true area of contact at a liquid metal-solid interface," Appl. Phys. Lett., vol. 40, no. 5, pp. 379-381, Mar. 1982.
47. D. Youngner, Honeywell AES Technology Centers of Excellence, 2007, private communication.
48. J. Simon, S. Saffer, and C.-J. Kim, "A micromechanical relay with thermally-drivenmercury micro-drop," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., San Diego, CA, 1996, pp. 515-520.
49. J. Simon, S. Saffer, and C.-J. Kim, "A liquid-filled microrelay with a moving mercury microdrop," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 208-216, Sep. 1997.
50. Y. Kondoh, T. Takenaka, T. Hidaka, G. Tejima, Y. Kaneko, and M. Saitoh, "High-reliability, high-performance RF micromachined switch using liquid metal," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 14, no. 2, pp. 214-220, Apr. 2005.
51. J. Kim, W. Shen, L. Latorre, and C.-J. Kim, "A micromechanical switch with electrostatically driven liquid-metal droplet," Sens. Actuators A, Phys., vol. 97/98, pp. 672-679, Apr. 2002.
52. T. Young, "An essay on the cohesion of fluids," Philos. Trans. Roy. Soc. London, vol. 95, pp. 65-87, 1805.
53. W. Shen, R. T. Edwards, and C.-J. Kim, "Electrostatically actuated metal-droplet microswitches integrated on CMOS chip," J. Microelectromech. Syst., vol. 15, no. 4, pp. 879-889, Aug. 2006.
54. W. Shen, R. T. Edwards, and C.-J. Kim, "Mercury droplet microswitch for reconfigurable circuit interconnect," in Tech. Dig. Int. Conf. Solid-State Sens. Actuators, Boston, MA, Jun. 2003, pp. 464-467.
55. C.-H. Choi and C.-J. Kim, "Large slip of aqueous liquid flow over a nano-engineered superhydrophobic surface," Phys. Rev. Lett., vol. 96, no. 6, p. 066 001, Feb. 2006.
56. J. Kim and C.-J. Kim, "Nanostructured surfaces for dramatic reduction of flow resistance in droplet-based microfluidics," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Las Vegas, NV, Jan. 2002, pp. 479-482.
57. W. Shen, J. Kim, and C.-J. Kim, "Controlling the adhesion force by physical surface modification for electrostatic actuation of microscale mercury droplets," in Proc. IEEE Conf. Micro Electro Mech. Syst., Las Vegas, NV, Jan. 2002, pp. 52-55.
58. W. Shen, J. Kim, and C.-J. Kim, "Resistance of liquid-metal droplets against actuation of microstructured surfaces," in Proc. Int. Mech. Eng. Congr. Expo., IMECE2001/MEMS-23830, New York, Nov. 2001.
59. P. Sen and C.-J. Kim, "Electrostatic fringe-field actuation for liquid-metal droplets," in Proc. 13th Int. Conf. Solid-State Sens., Actuators, Microsyst., Seoul, Korea, 2005, pp. 705-708.
60. P. Sen and C.-J. Kim, "A fast liquid-metal droplet switch using EWOD," in Proc. IEEE 20th Int. Conf. MEMS, Kobe, Japan, 2007, pp. 767-770.
61. J. Lee, H. Moon, J. Fowler, T. Schoellhammer, and C.-J. Kim, "Electrowetting and electrowetting-on-dielectric for microscale liquid handling," Sens. Actuators A, Phys., vol. 95, no. 2/3, pp. 259-268, Jan. 2002.
62. H. Moon, S.-K. Cho, R. L. Garrell, and C.-J. Kim, "Low voltage electrowetting-on-dielectric," J. Appl. Phys., vol. 92, no. 7, pp. 4080-4087, Oct. 2002.
63. P. M. S. D. de Moraes and A. J. Perin, "An electronic control unit for reducing contact bounce in electromagnetic contactors," IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 55, no. 2, pp. 861-870, Feb. 2008.
64. C.-H. Chen and D. Peroulis, "Electrostatic liquid-metal capacitive shunt MEMS switch," in IEEE MTT-S Int. Microw. Symp. Dig., Jun. 2006, pp. 263-266.
65. C.-H. Chen, J. Whalen, and D. Peroulis, "Non-toxic liquid-metal 2-100 GHz MEMS switch," in IEEE MTT-S Int. Microw. Symp. Dig., Jun. 2007, pp. 363-366.