Feedback loop design for an electrostatic voltmeter

The integration of MEMS sensors and interface circuitry has yielded low-cost, high-performance instruments with excellent reliability. In inertial sensing, deterministic electrical waveforms are applied to a MEMS capacitive element to determine an unknown deflection. The inverse of this measurement method can also be exploited: the MEMS element can be deterministically modulated to measure an unknown electrical variable. This paper presents the design of a non-contact electrostatic voltmeter using a MEMS-based electrostatic field meter