Abstract
A generalized foundry-oriented CMOS-MEMS platform well suited for integrated micromechanical resonators alongside IC amplifiers has been developed for commercial multi-user purpose and demonstrated with a fast turnaround time of only 3 months and a variety of design flexibilities for resonator applications. With this platform, different configurations of capacitively-transduced resonators monolithically integrated with their amplifier circuits, spanning frequencies from 500 kHz to 14.5 MHz, have been realized with resonator Q's ranging between 700 and 3500. This platform, specifically featured with various configurations of structural materials, multi-dimensional displacements, different arrangements of mechanical boundary conditions, tiny supports of resonators, large transduction areas, well-defined anchors and performance enhancement scaling with IC fabrication technology, offers a variety of flexible design options targeted for sensor, timing reference, and RF applications. In addition, resonators consisting of metal-oxide composite structures fabricated by this platform offer an effective temperature compensation scheme for the first time in CMOS-MEMS resonators, showing TC f six times better than that of resonators merely made by CMOS metals. © 2011 IOP Publishing Ltd.