MEMS TECHNOLOGIES FOR NOVEL GYROSCOPES

Gyroscopes have become an integral part of many application spaces ranging from consumer electronics to navigation. As navigation and movement tracking becomes necessary through inertial measurement units (that comprises gyroscopes and accelerometers) in myriad of scenarios especially when global navigation and satellite system (GNSS) is not available, stability of gyroscopes plays a detrimental role in the accuracy of navigation. Recent developments in micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) based gyroscopes enabled them to penetrate into navigation grade application spaces. MEMS based miniaturization approach also revived the interest in nuclear magnetic resonance gyroscopes (NMRGs). In parallel, emerging atomic gyroscope technologies are getting attention such as using quantum defects in single crystal diamond.

Considering innovative ways MEMS can improve gyroscopes, we investigate solid state gyroscope technologies in piezoelectric MEMS and nuclear spin based platforms for next generation rotation sensing that is shock and vibration insensitive. For the first part of this study, we explore a piezoelectric resonator that can excite wine-glass mode (WGM) and tangential mode. WGM is used for rotation sensing applications in various excitation mechanisms in literature. However, we demonstrate the capability of exciting WGM without the need for segmented electrodes in piezoelectric domain that allows self-alignment of the excitation electrodes using a unique property of Lead Magnesium Niobate-Lead Titanate (PMN-PT). In the second part of the study, we explore Nitrogen-Vacancy (NV) centers in diamond to be used as gyroscopes exploiting the rotation sensitivity of nuclear spins. NV center-based gyroscopes provide solid-state solution with comparable or superior performance without any moving parts. We propose mechanical coupling to NV centers in diamond using piezoelectrically excited bulk acoustic waves (BAW) to extend the coherence time of nuclear spins by dynamical decoupling. We explore piezoelectric coupling design space of AlN thin film BAW resonators (FBARs) to enable efficient mechanical drive to improve Rabi oscillations in diamond to overcome one of the most important bottlenecks of realizing a gyroscope, which is the mitigation and control of nuclear spin and electron spin interaction in diamond NV center system.