IEEE Italy Sensors Chapter

Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) have been one of the most revolutionary technologies for the first two decades of the XXI century. Throughout twenty years, they quickly led first to an unprecedented miniaturization of sensors of various physical quantities (motion, magnetic field, sonic and ultrasonic waves…) and then to the introduction of microscale actuators (mirrors, lenses, speakers). Even more remarkable is their key enabling role towards artificial intelligence systems, robotics, autonomous mobility, remote patient monitoring, virtual reality… which indicates that their development in the next three decades, until 2050, will be even faster, with growing performance and applications. These peculiar systems are often a delicate equilibrium between various physical domains, intuitively including micromechanics, electrics and electronics, but also involving fluidics, acoustics and thermodynamics. Their development thus requires cross fertilization of scientific knowledge in different engineering, physics mathematics and informatics sciences. The goal of the Summer School is to provide the fundamentals of their working principle, with advanced description of a few case studies. Starting from the underlying theoretical bases, key fabrication processes and innovative technologies will be described, with an outlook to future developments. Afterwards, advanced electromechanical and electronics design for accelerometers, gyroscopes, micromirrors and microspeakers will be discussed, including innovative working principles which are under research all over the world. The importance of advanced multi-physics modeling will be presented to students with examples belonging to different physical domains. Finally, taking the advantage of having several MEMS companies in the Lombardia region, an industrial perspective towards the next-generation MEMS era will show the students the paths and the opportunities which are opening up in this exciting field.