Release and transfer of large-area ultra-thin PDMS

This paper reports on the fabrication of ultra-thin (~10 μm) polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) films with embedded metal electrodes of 2 μm minimum feature size, as well as the release and transfer of large area films (>5 cm). The initial motivation for this work is the development of a miniature pump actuator for moving working fluid in an electrocaloric microcooler. PDMS diaphragms with electrodes are released and transferred onto contoured silicon chambers formed by gray-scale lithography and deep-reactive ion etching.