Random Access Addressing of MEMS Electrostatic Shutter Array for Multi-Object Astronomical Spectroscopy

An extended version of cross-bar type addressing technique is developed for three-port electrostatic micro shutters arranged in an arrayed format. A microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) shutter blade suspended by a pair of torsion beams works as a movable electrode that is either attracted upwards...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Xufeng Liu, Takuya Takahashi, Masahiro Konishi, Kentaro Motohara, Hiroshi Toshiyoshi
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020-08-01
Series:Micromachines
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2072-666X/11/8/782
Description
Summary:An extended version of cross-bar type addressing technique is developed for three-port electrostatic micro shutters arranged in an arrayed format. A microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) shutter blade suspended by a pair of torsion beams works as a movable electrode that is either attracted upwards to the cover plate to close the aperture or retracted downwards into the through-hole to open it. Tri-state positioning of the shutter—i.e., open, rest, and close—is controlled by the hysteresis loop of the electrostatic pull-in and release behavior using the combination of the voltages applied to the shutter, the cover, and the substrate. Random access addressing of the shutters is demonstrated by a control system composed of MATLAB-coded Arduino electronics. The shutter array developed in this work is for a sub-cluster of a reconfigurable shutter array under development for a multi-object galactic astronomy.
ISSN:2072-666X