Performance Enhancement of MEMS based Piezoelectric Pressure Sensor using Multistep Configuration

The work presents performance enhancement of MEMS based piezoelectric pressure sensor using multistep stack configuration. The structural optimization through multistep arrangement of the piezoelectric sensor exhibited the sensitivity enhancement of 85% for a range of applied pressures compared to the multi-layered sensor made from the same volume of Zinc Oxide. We also further investigate the design and analysis of multistep piezoelectric stack configuration of this MEMS sensor for significant characteristics improvisation using COMSOL Multiphysics. Essentially, the multistep configuration results in increase of coupling coefficient that ultimately contributes to the increase in sensitivity. Furthermore, the analysis of the evaluated parameters can be used for the design and optimization of these MEMS-based sensors for various bio-sensing applications due to the biocompatibility of Zinc Oxide. The obtained results for output voltage of Multistep arrangement at an applied pressure of 2.5kPa was 2.69 V as compared to 0.203V and 0.0186V for Multi-layered and Single layered configuration respectively.