Reducing adhesion energy of nano-electro-mechanical relay contacts by self-assembled Perfluoro (2,3-Dimethylbutan-2-ol) coating

Sara Fathipour; Sergio Fabian Almeida; Zhixin Alice Ye; Bivas Saha; Farnaz Niroui; Tsu-Jae King Liu; Junqiao Wu

doi:10.1063/1.5095760

AIP Advances (May 2019)

Reducing adhesion energy of nano-electro-mechanical relay contacts by self-assembled Perfluoro (2,3-Dimethylbutan-2-ol) coating

Sara Fathipour,
Sergio Fabian Almeida,
Zhixin Alice Ye,
Bivas Saha,
Farnaz Niroui,
Tsu-Jae King Liu,
Junqiao Wu

Affiliations

Sara Fathipour: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Sergio Fabian Almeida: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Zhixin Alice Ye: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Bivas Saha: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Farnaz Niroui: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
Tsu-Jae King Liu: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Junqiao Wu: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5095760
Journal volume & issue: Vol. 9, no. 5
pp. 055329 – 055329-5

Abstract

Read online

To enable energy-efficient electronic devices for the future, nano-electro-mechanical (NEM) relays are promising due to their high ON/OFF current ratio and potential for low operating voltage. To minimize hysteresis and, consequently, relay operating voltage, it is imperative to reduce the relay contact adhesion, which can be achieved by coating the contacts with anti-stiction self-assembled monolayers. Herein we report a 71% reduction in hysteresis voltage by utilizing a branched perfluorocarbon antistiction molecule: Perfluoro (2,3-Dimethylbutan-2-ol) (PDB) on top of the tungsten contact surfaces. Experimental results show the operation of a PDB-coated NEM relay with abrupt switching, undetectably low OFF-state current, hysteresis voltage as low as 20 mV, and a large ON/OFF current ratio (>107).

Published in AIP Advances

ISSN: 2158-3226 (Online)
Publisher: AIP Publishing LLC
Country of publisher: United States
LCC subjects: Science: Physics
Website: http://aipadvances.aip.org/

About the journal