A micromachined Pirani gauge with dual heat sinks

This paper reports a micromachined Pirani gauge with dual heat sinks, which can be integrated with MEMS devices inside a vacuum package to monitor long-term pressure changes and stability inside the package. The gauge utilizes small gaps (<1 /spl mu/m) between its heater and two thermal sinks to obtain large dynamic range (20 mTorr to 2 Torr) and high sensitivity (3.5/spl times/10/sup 5/ (K/W)/Torr). This gauge can resolve leak rates inside a small sealed cavity as low as 3/spl times/10/sup -16/ cm/sup 3//sec.