Design and validation of the control circuits for a micro-cantilever tool for a micro-robot

The objective of this paper is to present the design and validation of a cantilever-based contact sensing system for a micro-robot. Key elements of the fabrication process of the sensor and the electrical model extraction used to design the control electronics are described. The architecture used for the sensor corresponds to a micro-cantilever fabricated of piezoelectric-polyvinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene stacked in a multilayer structure with the possibility of both actuating and sensing. A lumped electro mechanical equivalent model of the micro-cantilever was used to design the control electronics for the cantilever. A driving signal from, the control system is used to vibrate the cantilever at its first mechanical resonance frequency. The control system contains an analog front-end to measure the sensor output signal and a digital control unit designed to track and keep the resonance frequency of the cantilever. By integrating the cantilever control system is integrated in the application specified integrated circuit used to control of the circuit is simplyfied and very compact. Experimental results show a similar behavior between the electrical model and the fabricated system, and the deviations between the model and the measured structure are analyzed. The results also show that the designed control system is capable to detect the resonance frequency of the system and to actuate despite small deviations in process parameters of different batches of cantilevers. The whole system was designed to be integrated into an autonomous micro-robot, although it can be used in other applications. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.