On-chip characterization of stress effects on gyroscope zero rate output and scale factor

Stress effects on performance are quantified for a vacuum packaged silicon-on-insulator (SOI) MEMS gyroscope, including zero rate output (ZRO), scale factor (SF), and resonance frequencies. On-chip environmental sensors comprising released SOI-silicon resistors in a bridge measure the temperature and stress separately. Experimental results from a four-point bending test-bed lead to a system model to compensate the gyroscope ZRO using the environmental sensor outputs. The ZRO shift varied linearly with stress, with a measured maximum of 3.5 °/s for 533 kPa applied external stress.