“assist-free”assembly technique of standing optical devices on soft spring actuator stages

Abstract

In this study, a new assembly technique of separately fabricated MEMS optical devices on fragile MEMS actuator stages has been developed to realize novel functional optical-MEMS devices. This technique realizes the “assist-free” alignment and fixing of vertically mounted optical devices by combination of “micro spring slider” and “trapezoidal alignment slit”. Various kinds of optical devices can be precisely aligned and stably fixed even on movable actuator stages supported by soft spring suspensions. In the experiments, micro mirrors were attached on electrostatic linear actuators and rotational actuators using this assembly technique, and a small average value of relative-angle error around 4/100 ° was successfully obtained.