Design and Experimental Validation of a Piezoelectric Resonant MEMS Phase Comparator

In this paper, the design, concept and experimental validation of the performances of a piezoelectric resonant microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) phase comparator is presented. Compared to traditional integrated circuits, the potential benefits of a MEMS phase comparator include a low power consumption, higher sensitivity, higher selectivity and improved robustness. The design and experimental validation of a resonant MEMS phase comparator are presented along with characterization recommendations. The operation of this resonant MEMS phase comparator is experimentally validated over the first five eigen modes at 108 kHz, 298.7 kHz, 583.3 kHz, 962.8 kHz and 1.4375 MHz. Calibration of the resonant MEMS phase comparator is presented, allowing for simple device operation, which is validated under various waveform stimulations: sinusoidal, square, and triangular. This work is expected to lead to the development of new applications for MEMS resonating devices.