A Systematic Approach to Process Selection in MEMS

A systematic approach is developed to select manufacturing Process Chains for the generic elements of a MEMS device. A database of MEMS Process Chains and their attendant process attributes is developed from an extensive review of the literature, and used to construct Process Attribute charts. The performance requirements of MEMS beams and trenches are translated into the same set of Process Attributes. This allows for a screening of the Process Chains to obtain a list of candidate manufacturing methods. This method is illustrated in a brief design example.1202