Resonance Frequency Measurement Unit (RFMU) for the Dynamic Characterization of Nanomechanical Resonator

Nanomechanical resonators play a pivotal role in highly efficient sensors, detectors and switching applications. Efficient growth in the field of sensor technology demands robust characterization tools that can measure the sensitivity and detectivity of the devices. Herein, we designed and implemented a non-contact based optical measurement technique that can characterize the dynamic properties of the nanomechanical devices with much greater precision both ambient and high vacuum conditions at different temperatures. The in house-built test setup can determine the four major physical quantities of the nanomechanical resonators: (i) resonance frequency (fr), (ii) sensitivity (α<sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><i>f</i></sub>), (iii) phase and (iv) quality factor (Q) using simple free space optics technique without any interferometric technique by taking advantage of measuring modulated intensity from a movable object. In this study the test samples such as microcantilever devices with various dimensions were employed to measure the dynamic properties (resonance frequency, phase angle, quality factor and sensitivity) of the devices. Further, the theoretical validations were performed by implementing the physical models which gives accurate results with minimum error, making this setup phenomenal and ready to implement in the research and development (R&D) industries and academic laboratories.