Study of Contact Resistance for Curled-Up Beams in Waveguide Switch

In this letter, we are proposing a new technique to determine the contact resistance of the curled up beams in RF MEMS waveguide switches. Unlike the previous studies on the contact resistance of RF MEMS switches, here the contact resistance is measured at the “OFF” state of the switch with no dc voltage applied. The presented concept has been analyzed theoretically and verified by simulations and experimental data, illustrating less than 10% error. This study provides a measure for estimating the contact resistance of the emerging RF and millimeter-wave MEMS waveguide switches and paves the way for commercialization of such devices.