Light Responsive MEMS

Brian Ivancic, Mike Tasevski, Ben Bolyard, Dave Patil

Problem Description
 Reaction times of thermal and chemical expansion
• On the slower end of current designs
• Not easily controlled or sustainable
 Large Hysteresis
• Require large changes in heat or chemical balance to invoke
change in shape
Conceptual Ideas
 Use of a polymer gel
• Easily deformed by external stimuli like light
• Can react to these changes with constant temperature and
chemical levels
• Reduction in reaction time
• Reach the hysteresis levels faster
• Easily measureable and controlled input
• Downscaling of gel size results in faster response times
Polymer gels
 Polymer Gel
• Defined as a substantially dilute cross-linked system
• Behave like solids due to 3-D cross-linking
 Crosslinks
• Bond the polymer chains of the gel together
• Can be reoriented with change in intensity of light which in
turn provide a large volume transition for the gel.


Crossl-link Response to Light
Optical Switching in Polymer Gels
(A.Suzuki, T. Ishii, and Y. Maruyama)
Use of Polymer gel
 Volume Change
• Swells when in Solution up to 100% of volume
• Change in volume can be used to create mechanical work
• UV or visible light can be used as a stimulus which causes
cross-links to form
• Cross-links organize the structure of the gel into a shrunken
solid state with certain intensities
Governing Equation
 Light Intensity

 Where E is the complex amplitude of the electric field

 C is the speed of light in a vacuum
 e is the vacuum permittivity
 n is the refractive index
Governing Equations
 Refractive Index

 Where c is the speed of

light in a vacuum
 v is the phase speed of
radiation of a specific
frequency in a specific
material
 After 280 nm, refractive
index remains ~1.46
Governing Equations
 Osmotic Swelling Pressure (Π)
• a measure of the force that a given hydro gel, can exert on a pressure sensor

• Where V1 is the molar volume of water, n1 is the number of moles of water, μ1 is the chemical
potential value for water in the hydrogel at ambient pressure, and μ1,0 is the chemical potential
value for water in the reference solution that surrounds the hydrogel.
 Capacitance
• Parallel Plate Capacitor
• capacitance is directly proportional to the surface area of the conductor plates and inversely
proportional to the separation distance between the plates.

• Capacitance of simple Parallel Plate is equal to:

• Where “e” is emissivity, “A” is area, and d is distance

Design
Design

4
Fabrication
Sensor
 Intensity is a function of refractive index

 Refractive index is a function of thickness (empirical data)

 n=f(thickness)
 Time is proportional to √thickness
 With two or more different thicknesses, there will be a
time difference.
 Given certain time differences we can construct a
calibration of time difference vs. intensity.
Applications
 Can detect light intensity

• Fiber optics will be used to transmit the light to the hydrogel

• The fiber optics can be placed in different positions and the
sensors in the array will have different swelling due to different
intensity.
• The voltage differences can be monitored and used as feedback
for a direction sensing system.
• Possibly light communication
References
 Dynamics of Smart Structures, Ranjan Vepa, 2010
 Responsive Polymer Materials (Designs and Aplications),
Sergiy Minko, 2006
 Optical switching in polymer gels, A. Suzuki, T. Ishii, and
Y. Maruyama, 1997