Micromachining Process Of Piezoelectric Microcantilever Using Pzt Thin Film

A new process for fabrication of piezoelectric micro-cantilever arrays with PZT thin film for micro or nano range actuation has been developed. By choosing different DRIE etching process, 2 kinds of microcantilever can be fabricated and also we can almost fabricate membrane PZT cantilever with 100% yield, which is impossible in other normal fabrication process due to the over etching of the silicon resulting in some cantilever broken. Film annealing temperature and time critical to the preparation of the sol-gel PZT thin film. The fabrication process of micro-cantilever arrays in planar structure will be presented. Key issues on the fabrication of the cantilever are: the compatible etching process of PZT thin film, the compensation of thin film stress in all layers to obtain a flat multilayer structure.