Abstract :
[en] Because of the strong coupling between mechanical and electrical phenomena existing in electromechanical microdevices, some of them experience, above a given driving voltage, an unstable behavior called pull-in effect. The present paper investigates the application of topology optimization to electromechanical microdevices for the purpose of delaying this unstable behavior by maximizing their pull-in voltage. Within the framework of this preliminary study, the pull-in voltage maximization procedure is developed on the basis of electromechanical microbeams reinforcement topology design problem. The proposed sensitivity analysis requires only the knowledge of the microdevice pull-in state and of the first eigenmode of the tangent stiffness matrix. As the pull-in point research is a highly non-linear problem, the analysis is based on a monolithic finite element formulation combined with a normal flow algorithm (homotopy method). An application of the developed method is proposed and the result is compared to the one obtained using a linear compliance optimization. Moreover, as the results provided by the developed method do not comply with manufacturing constraints, a deposition process constraint is added to the optimization problem and its effect on the final design is also tested.
Disciplines :
Electrical & electronics engineering
Engineering, computing & technology: Multidisciplinary, general & others
Mechanical engineering
Aerospace & aeronautics engineering
Name of the research project :
ARC03/08-298 "Modeling, Multiphysics Simulation and Optimization of Coupled Problems - Application to Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems"
Scopus citations®
without self-citations
17