Development of a MEMS rotation sensor for oilfield applications

A new capacitive microelectromechanical rotation sensor (R-MEMS) with very high performances (low noise, high bandwidth) was developed for oilfield applications. After a thorough design phase based on analytical, finite element and MATLAB/Simulink models, the first R-MEMS prototypes were microfabricated using an optimized deep reactive ion etching (DRIE) process of thick silicon on insulator (SOI) wafers and then characterized in open-loop and closed-loop configurations. Further investigations along with simulations showed different design improvements to lower the noise floor and results with the latest R-MEMS prototypes are presented.