Sensors 2008, 8(2), 994-1003; doi:10.3390/s8020994
Article

A Perturbation Method for the 3D Finite Element Modeling of Electrostatically Driven MEMS

Mohamed Boutaayamou 1,* email, Ruth V. Sabariego 1 email and Patrick Dular 1 email
1 Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Applied and Computational Electromagnetics (ACE), 1 University of Liège B-4000, Li`ege, Belgium 2 FNRS Sart Tilman Campus, Building B28, B-4000, Li`ege, Belgium
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 14 September 2007 / Accepted: 8 February 2008 / Published: 19 February 2008
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Modeling, Testing and Reliability Issues in MEMS Engineering)
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Abstract: In this paper, a finite element (FE) procedure for modeling electrostatically actu-ated MEMS is presented. It concerns a perturbation method for computing electrostatic fielddistortions due to moving conductors. The computation is split in two steps. First, an un-perturbed problem (in the absence of certain conductors) is solved with the conventional FEmethod in the complete domain. Second, a perturbation problem is solved in a reduced re-gion with an additional conductor using the solution of the unperturbed problem as a source.When the perturbing region is close to the original source field, an iterative computation maybe required. The developed procedure offers the advantage of solving sub-problems in re-duced domains and consequently of benefiting from different problem-adapted meshes. Thisapproach allows for computational efficiency by decreasing the size of the problem.
Keywords: Electrostatic field distortions; finite element method; perturbation method; MEMS.

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MDPI and ACS Style

Boutaayamou, M.; Sabariego, R.V.; Dular, P. A Perturbation Method for the 3D Finite Element Modeling of Electrostatically Driven MEMS. Sensors 2008, 8, 994-1003.

AMA Style

Boutaayamou M, Sabariego RV, Dular P. A Perturbation Method for the 3D Finite Element Modeling of Electrostatically Driven MEMS. Sensors. 2008; 8(2):994-1003.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Boutaayamou, Mohamed; Sabariego, Ruth V.; Dular, Patrick. 2008. "A Perturbation Method for the 3D Finite Element Modeling of Electrostatically Driven MEMS." Sensors 8, no. 2: 994-1003.

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