Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems, or MEMS, is an enabling technology that enhances the user experience with a variety of products. It can generally be characterized as miniaturized mechanical and electro-mechanical elements that are created using the techniques of microfabrication.
According to the market research firm IHS, MEMS technology is poised for great growth. The firm estimates that shipments of MEMS devices will expand from 9.3 billion units in 2013 to 22.2 billion units in 2018. In terms of revenue, the MEMS market will grow from almost $9 billion in 2013 to $12.3 billion in 2018.
Karen Lightman, MEMS Industry Group (MIG) executive director, believes the technology is infiltrating many aspects of our everyday lives. “We wouldn’t have the success of SUVs if it weren’t for anti-rollover technology enabled by MEMS,” she says. “They’re in chemical sensors that measure environmental contaminants, which tell us if water is potable or air quality is safe. They’re in football helmets for concussion detection, and in every consumer electronics device imaginable.”
The technology has significantly evolved over the past ten years, thanks in part to the evolution of MEMS accelerometers, which were first used in automotive airbags about thirty years ago, and in gaming applications like the Nintendo Wii and in the iPhone in 2007.
Since then, there has been a huge increase in the demand for MEMS, which the MEMS industry has ably met through high-volume manufacturing processes and technologies that didn’t exist just 20 years ago. MEMS technology has become more reliable, less costly, higher performing, and even smaller – all of which lend themselves to such high-volume markets.
“Now we see MEMS integrating with a greater numbers of sensors (including various types of MEMS devices) to become fully integrated systems utilizing algorithm software (sensor fusion) to reduce power consumption while increasing capability,” explains Lightman.
Foreseeable Challenges
MEMS technology is headed to the Internet of Things (IoT), and that means IoT will also require standards. “There would be no IoT without MEMS and sensors, because they’re the bedrock of IoT,” explains Lightman. “We can’t have a connected home or connected car or connected street, city, world, without the sensors and MEMS devices that capture the data in order to make a smarter, connected world.”
Over the next five to ten years, the industry will also have to address the challenges of higher integration devices, testing, packaging, product validation, product calibration, interoperability, power consumption, and security.
“There is a need for more standards and standardization,” says Lightman. To work towards the development of such standards, MEMS Industry Group assisted in the creation of the first-ever MEMS and sensor standards for performance specifications – the IEEE 2700. It’s the initial step in creating a common/baseline for measuring MEMS and sensors.
The next step will be to find ways to standardize the testing of these standards. MIG is currently working with IEEE Standards Association and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) on these efforts. “We also support the efforts underway by our partner, the MIPI Alliance, which has developed a new sensor interface specification for mobile, mobile-influenced, and embeddedsystem applications, MIPI I3C,” says Lightman.”
Although the MEMS industry faces many challenges and technical issues, there are breakthroughs in MEMS technology every day. For example, there have been some developments in MEMS oscillators, MEMS energy harvesting, BioMEMS, and RF MEMS switches of late.
Even MEMS devices that have been around for a long time, such as pressure sensors, are finding new uses in combo products, where they are integrated with temperature and humidity sensors to comprise a new class of environmental sensors.
As the technology has evolved from miniaturized, singlefunction systems into increasingly complex integrated systems, the latest generation of smart systems has become self-sufficient intelligent technical systems, or subsystems, with advanced functionality, which brings together actuation, sensing, data processing, and informatics. There are already many applications for MEMS in smart driving, smart environments, and smart things.
A Bright Future
Over the course of the past few decades, MEMS developers have showcased a large number of microsensors for almost every sensing modality, including pressure, chemical species, inertial forces, temperature, magnetic fields, and radiation. In recent years, the developers have demonstrated a number of microactuators.
The industry is looking forward to the day when microsensors, microactuators, and microelectronics can be integrated onto a single microchip. When this happens, augmenting the computational ability of microelectronics with the perception and control capabilities of microactuators and microsensors will enable increasingly smarter products.
In Lightman’s perspective, the future of MEMS technology will also be able to solve some of our planet’s most worrisome healthcare and wellness problems. “I honestly think that it will play a role in helping cure cancer (as DNA sequencing is enabled by MEMS) and will combat other deadly diseases,” she adds. “I believe that MEMS and sensors will help us to live independent and healthier lives in a smarter and safer world.”
This article originally appeared in the November/December 2015 print edition of PD&D.
