Support compliance: A non-ignorable factor for cantilever sensors for MEMS application

Support compliance at the fixed end of cantilever beams has significant effects on the measured modulus of elasticity in bending (Eb) and accurate deflection response. Additional deflection caused by support compliance is an easily neglected but an inevitable factor, which results in the large errors of the measured Eb. An effective strategy to design cantilever sensors was proposed by enhancing the loading distance, which not only improve the sensitivity, but also weaken the support compliance effect. In a nutshell, the support compliance effect must be taken into accounted by engineers carefully to improve the accuracy of the measured Eb and deflection response for cantilever sensors which used in MEMS.