AVS 62nd International Symposium & Exhibition
    MEMS and NEMS Tuesday Sessions
       Session MN+BI-TuA

Paper MN+BI-TuA9
Microparticle Patterning Using Multimode Silicon Carbide Micromechanical Resonators

Tuesday, October 20, 2015, 5:00 pm, Room 211A

Session: BioMEMS/NEMS, Wearable and Implantable Devices
Presenter: Hao Jia, Case Western Reserve University
Authors: H. Jia, Case Western Reserve University
H. Tang, Case Western Reserve University
P.X.-L. Feng, Case Western Reserve University
Correspondent: Click to Email
In recent years, there have been increasing interests in manipulating and patterning microparticles and biological cells on microscale planar surfaces[1],[2],[3], among which “Chladni figures”[4], enabled by resonant microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)[5], offer a noninvasive, fast, and highly-controllable approach by simply programming frequency.

In this work, we report experimental demonstration of manipulating microparticles in fluidic environment using multimode silicon carbide (SiC) MEMS resonators, forming diverse microscale Chladni patterns. Silica microspheres with various diameters (0.96, 1.70, 3.62, 7.75μm) sprinkled onto suspended surfaces of SiC doubly-clamped beams (60×10μm, 100×10μm and 100×20μm) and square trampolines (50×50μm and 90×90μm) are quickly manipulated into one dimensional (1D) and two dimensional (2D) geometrical patterns, such as “dots (.)”, “line (/)”, “cross (×)” and “circle (○)” by piezoelectrically exciting those resonators at their flexural resonance modes.

SiC MEMS resonators, with its unique biocompatibility[6](indicating biological applications), are fabricated based on a SiC-on-Si platform, with device structures patterned by the focused ion beam (FIB) and suspended by an isotropic Si etching (HNA, 10% HF: 70% HNO3=1:1). Multimode resonances in liquid (up to 5MHz) are characterized using laser interferometry[6], based on which the piezoelectric driving frequencies are switched in real-time to strongly excite the microspheres and manipulate them into a series of Chladni patterns. Such SiC resonating platform, by taking advantage of its straightforward device fabrication and engineerable multimodes, offer new means for microparticle manipulation and patterning, and may further facilitate cell manipulation, and other biophysical and biomedical studies.

[1] R. S. Kane, et al., Biomaterials, vol. 20, no. 23–24, pp. 2363–2376, 1999.

[2] X. Zhou, et al., Small, vol. 7, no. 16, pp. 2273–2289, 2011.

[3] X. Ding, et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., vol. 109, no. 28, pp. 11105–11109, 2012.

[4] E. F. F. Chladni, Entdeckungen über die Theory des Klanges, Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1787.

[5] M. Dorrestijn, et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., vol. 98, no. 2, pp. 026102, 2007.

[6] H. Jia, et al., MEMS 2015, pp. 698–701, Estoril, Portugal, Jan. 18–22, 2015.