Low temperature study of loss mechanisms of mechanical oscillators

In order to understand the loss mechanism of mechanical oscillators in micro-electromechanical systems, we have studied the temperature dependence of the quality factor Q of a high Q silicon mechanical oscillator from 0.4 to 300 K . At temperatures above 70 K , the energy loss is principally caused...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPhysica. B, Condensed matter Vol. 316; pp. 393 - 396
Main Authors Liu, Xiao, Vignola, J.F., Photiadis, D.M., Sarkissian, A., Houston, B.H., Merithew, R.D., Pohl, R.O.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Elsevier B.V 01.05.2002
Subjects
Mechanical oscillator
Micro-electromechanical system
Quality factor
Micro-electromechanical system
Quality factor
Mechanical oscillator
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Summary:In order to understand the loss mechanism of mechanical oscillators in micro-electromechanical systems, we have studied the temperature dependence of the quality factor Q of a high Q silicon mechanical oscillator from 0.4 to 300 K . At temperatures above 70 K , the energy loss is principally caused by thermoelastic effect in the flexural components of the modes. Below 50 K , we find the improvements in vibration isolation guided by the finite element method which do not significantly improve its Q. This indicates that some intrinsic loss mechanism may still be important even at low temperatures.
ISSN:0921-4526
1873-2135
DOI:10.1016/S0921-4526(02)00523-9