A design method and its CAD prototype system for surface micromachined MEMS devices

Now the MEMS design method of “bottom–up” (mask-to-shape-to-function) has been adopted widely. However, it is complicated, time-consuming and not straightforward and can’t meet the demand of MEMS development. In this paper, a 3D MEMS aided design method is studied for surface micromachined MEMS devices, which adopts the design procedure of function-to-shape-to-mask. With this method, 3D geometric models of surface micromachined MEMS devices are built by selecting 3D MEMS features from the developed feature database after functional requirement analysis and concept design have been made. After the geometric model is analyzed with FEM analysis tools, 2D candidate masks and process flow are automatically generated by analyzing geometric information and material information of the model. Meanwhile, a 3D MEMS CAD prototype system of this method is developed based on SolidWorks. Finally a torsional micromirror is designed to verify the validity of the design method and its CAD prototype system. The practical example shows that 3D MEMS design method can help designers develop MEMS devices straightforwardly and obtain 2D masks and process flow automatically, and the developed 3D MEMS CAD prototype system based on SolidWorks can make MEMS device design easily.