CMOS compatible edge coupled capacitive MEMS switch for RF applications

Abstract

This paper presents the design, simulation and fabrication of a CMOS process compatible capacitive MEMS switch. The MEMS switch uses thermal actuation and finger structures for capacitive coupling. The design is fabricated using commercial 0.6 um CMOS process and post-processed using mask-less RIE process. Results show that the insertion loss is 0.7 dB at 2 GHz and the isolation is 30 dB at 2 GHz. The actuation voltage is 1.5v. The switch demonstrates high isolation and low insertion loss, it well fits for RF applications like configurable voltage control oscillators and configurable matching networks.