NANOMETER RESOLUTION 2-D IN-PLANE SAW MOTOR

An in-plane two-dimensional ultrasonic motor using surface acoustic wave (SAW)---2-D SAW motor--- is reported. The motor utilizes propagating Rayleigh wave, a kind of SAW, for friction drive. To independently drive a slider in X- or Y-direction, four interdigital transducers (IDTs) were fabricated on ends of a stator plane to excite X- or Y-propagating Rayleigh wave. The operation area of the motor, namely the inside area surrounded by the four IDTs, was 14x14 mm 2 . Since both the stator and slider are made of surface polished crystal substrates, the operational plane of the slider is flat and smooth on nanometer scale. The 2-D SAW motor performed less than 10 nm stepping motion every 0.2 ms for both directions. The motor also exhibited high speed, up to 0.5 m/s and 0.15 m/s for X- and Y-direction, respectively. The 2-D SAW motor showed excellent features for 2-D precise positioning actuator.

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