Abstract
Polydimethylsiloxane microstructures such as cantilevers are useful for nanomechanical measurements of biomolecules, living cells, and soft matter. As a fundamental characterization, we report thermomechanical noise measurements of the flexural modes of polydimethylsiloxane cantilevers, which were fabricated by multilayer soft lithography. From the resonance frequency data, we extracted the values of Young's moduli for different cross-linking ratios. Our devices have measured resonance frequencies and quality factors ranging from 405 Hz to 1.63 kHz and from 5 to 10, respectively. Our analysis shows that these cantilevers will be able to perform nanomechanical measurements with piconewton force resolution. © 2013 Copyright 2013 Author(s). This article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.