Fabrication and Analysis of Thin Film Lithum Niobate Resonators for 5GHz Frequency and Large Kt2 Applications

• Published in: 2021 IEEE 34th International Conference on Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) pp. 967 - 969
• Main Authors: Yandrapalli, Soumya, Kucuk, Seniz Esra, Atakan, Baris, Plessky, Victor, Villanueva, Luis Guillermo
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 25.01.2021
• Subjects: 5G application; 5GHz; A1 mode; bulk acoustic resonator; electromechanical coupling; Fabrication; Frequency measurement; k t 2 . RF MEMS; Lamb wave; large bandwidth; Lithium niobate; Micromechanical devices; Resonant frequency; Resonator filters; Resonators; thin films
• ISSN: 2160-1968
• DOI: 10.1109/MEMS51782.2021.9375401

This work presents the fabrication and analysis of suspended thin film Lithium Niobate resonators. The yield of the new fabrication process presented below is >90% showing devices with high k t 2 of 28% resonators at 5GHz, making them suitable for high frequency and large bandwidth 5G filter applications.The device consists of a suspended thin film Lithium Niobate (LN) with interdigitated aluminum electrodes. These Interdigitated Transducers (IDTs) excite standing shear YZ acoustic A1 mode in a Z-cut LiNbO 3 resonator. Dependence of frequency, electromechanical coupling (k t 2 ) and spurious modes is demonstrated on design parameters by simulations and measurements. These parameters are used to study frequency tunability and eliminate spurious modes of resonators for 5G filter applications. Currently demonstrated devices is also suitable to be scaled for mass production by using deep UV lithography instead of e-beam.