Sharif Digital Repository

Due to the necessity for methods that are able to handle complexities of systems, use of Method Engineering (ME) to construct more adaptable and flexible methods has become of importance. Assemblybased approach is the most well-known approach of ME that performs method construction by reusing and assembling different method fragments. This approach, like other approaches of ME, suffers from the lack of suitable guidelines. In this way, architecture-centric method engineering (ArCME) is a new approach which aims at performing ME processes in a more disciplined and cohesive way. In this paper, process of assemblybased ME is enhanced by ArCME. Furthermore, benefits of implementing the process... 

The use of micromechanical models to study composite material's behavior leads to save time and cost. In this paper, bridging micromechanical models have been used in order to observe the behavior of unidirectional laminate composite under fatigue loading. In order to study the fatigue behavior, stiffness degradation has been studied as well as the strength degradation and a driftnet model has been proposed for each of them. The strength degradation has only been studied for the unidirectional fiber, while the stiffness degradation has been studied for the fibers with different fiber angle. The results are compared with macro-mechanical models and other methods in literature  

The overall mechanical properties of composite materials are dependent on the mechanical response of individual constituents and their interactions while they may be relatively easy to determine. This paper represents a simulation process by which the cyclic stresses and fatigue loadings on its constituents could be predicted for an under fatigue loading lamina. Hence, the unidirectional composites fatigue would be studied through its constituents. The proposed model introduces a new coupled stiffness/strength technique by relating lamina stiffness to the stress field in its constituents. Therefore, the stress field and strength considerations in its constituents could be studied when the... 

In this paper the static deflection and pull-in instability of electrostatically actuated microcantilevers is investigated based on the strain gradient theory. The equation of motion and boundary conditions are derived using Hamilton's principle and solved numerically. It is shown that the strain gradient theory predicts size dependent normalized static deflection and pull-in voltage for the microbeam while according to the classical theory the normalized behavior of the microbeam is independent of its size. The results of strain gradient theory are compared with those of classical and modified couple stress theories and also experimental observations. According to this comparison, the... 

The stress distribution on open-ended Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs) embedded in a composite material is considered in this work and an analytical solution for the stress distribution has been obtained. The effects of CNT's thickness and CNT's length on the distribution of stress have been investigated. To find the governing relations, continuity equations of the axisymmetric problem in cylindrical coordinate (r,o,z) are used. Under some assumptions, the governing equations are solved and by using constitutive equations and applying the boundary conditions, an equation which relates the stress applied to the representative volume element with the stress distribution on the CNT, has been found. The... 

In this paper, a novel microfabrication process of a six DOF thermal compliant nanopositioner is presented. The microfabrication process was based on bulk micromachining process. By using this process some important operational restrictions which are usually created by surface micromachining were removed. Moreover, this novel process does not need SOI wafers and needs only ordinary wafers. Therefore, it makes microfabrication process cheaper than surface micromachining processes where SOI wafer should be used. This method is completely appropriate for microactuators which have 120 degree misalignment. Finally, a primary test by using interferometer method was used to test connection of... 

The operational range of microcantilever beams under electrostatic force can be extended beyond pull-in in the presence of an intermediate dielectric layer. In this paper, a systematic method for deriving dynamic equation of microcantilevers under electrostatic force is presented. This model covers the behavior of the microcantilevers before and after the pull-in including the effects of van der Waals force, squeeze-film damping, and contact bounce. First, a polynomial approximate shape function with a time-dependent variable for each configuration is defined. Using Hamilton's principle, dynamic equations of microcantilever in all configurations have been derived. Comparison between modeling... 

An analytical approach is proposed for studying the elastic-plastic behavior of short fiber reinforced metal matrix composites under tensile loading. In the proposed method, a micromechanical approach is employed, considering an axi-symmetric unit cell including one fiber and the surrounding matrix. First, the governing equations and the boundary conditions are derived and the elastic solution is obtained based on some shear lag type methods. A plastic deformation is considered for the matrix under each small tensile loading step. Then, applying the successive elastic solutions method, all the plastic strain terms are obtained for the matrix. Thereafter, the elastic-plastic stress transfer... 

In this paper, a nonlinear model is used to analyze the dynamic pull-in instability and vibrational behavior of a microcantilever gyroscope. The gyroscope has a proof mass at its end and is subjected to nonlinear squeeze film damping, step DC voltages as well as base rotation excitation. The electrostatically actuated and detected microgyroscopes are subjected to coupled flexural-flexural vibrations that are related by base rotation. In order to detune the stiffness and natural frequencies of the system, DC voltages are applied to the proof mass electrodes in drive and sense directions. Nonlinear integro differential equations of the system are derived using extended Hamilton principle... 

This paper is concerned with the study of the oscillatory behavior of an electrostatically actuated microcantilever gyroscope with a proof mass attached to its free end. In mathematical modeling, the effects of different nonlinearities such as electrostatic forces, fringing field, inertial terms and geometric nonlinearities are considered. The microgyroscope is subjected to bending oscillations around the static deflection coupled with base rotation. The primary oscillation is generated in drive direction of the microgyroscope by a pair of DC and AC voltages on the tip mass. The secondary oscillation occurring in the sense direction is induced by the Coriolis coupling caused by the input... 

In this paper, a mathematical modeling of a microcantilever gyroscope is presented considering the nonlinearities of the system due to electrostatic forces, fringing field, geometry and the inertial terms. The microgyroscope is actuated and detected by electrostatic methods and subjected to coupled bending oscillations. First a system of two nonlinear integro-differential equations is derived which describes flexural-flexural motion of electrostatically actuated and detected microbeam gyroscopes. Afterward, static deflection and pull-in instability of the microgyroscopes acted upon by DC voltages in both (driving and sensing) directions are studied for different parameters. The model's... 

Vibratory micromachined gyroscopes use suspending mechanical parts to measure rotation. They have no gyratory component that require bearings, and for this reason they can be easily miniaturized and batch production using micromachining methods. They operate based on the energy interchange between two modes of structural vibration. The objective of this paper is to study the oscillatory behavior of an electrostatically actuated vibrating microcantilever gyroscope with proof mass at its end. In the modelling, the effects of different nonlinearities, fringing field and base rotation are considered. The microgyroscope is subjected to coupled bending oscillations around the static deflection... 

In this paper, utilizing the non-local theory, the resonant frequency and sensitivity of an AFM microcantilever are investigated. To that end, the governing equation of motion and corresponding boundary conditions are obtained using the variational approach. Afterwards, the resonant frequency and sensitivity of the AFM microcantilever are derived analytically and depicted in some figures versus the contact stiffness of the sampling surface. The results of the current model are compared to those of the classical theory. The comparison shows that the difference between the results of the non-local theory and those of the classical theory is significant when the non-local parameter is high but... 

This paper investigates the deflection and static pull-in voltage of microcantilevers based on the modified couple stress theory, a non-classic continuum theory capable to predict the size effects for structures in micron and sub-micron scales. It is shown that the couple stress theory can remove the gap between the experimental observations and the classical theory based simulations for the static pull-in voltage  

In this paper, the resonant frequency and sensitivity of atomic force microscope (AFM) microcantilevers are studied using the modified couple stress theory. The classical continuum mechanics is incapable of interpreting micro-structure-dependent size effects when the size of structures is in micron- and sub-micron scales. However, this dependency can be well treated by using non-classical continuum theories. The modified couple stress theory is a non-classic continuum theory which employs additional material parameters besides those appearing in classical continuum theory to treat the size-dependent behavior. In this work, writing differential equations of motion of AFM cantilevers together... 

Improvement of microcantilever-based sensors and actuators chiefly depends on how comprehensively they are modeled and precisely formulated. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) is the most widespread application of microcantilever beam as a sensor, which is usually influenced by the tip-sample interaction force. For this, vibration of AFM microcantilever probe is analyzed in this paper, along with analytical, numerical and experimental investigation of the influence of the sample interaction force on the microcantilever vibration. Nonlinear integro-partial equation of microcantilever vibration subject to the tip-sample interaction is then derived and numerically simulated. Moreover, multiple time... 

Microcantilever beams are frequently utilized in microelectromechanical systems. The operational range of microcantilever beams under electrostatic force can be extended beyond pull-in in the presence of an intermediate dielectric layer, which has a significant effect on the behavior of the system. Three possible configurations of the beam over the operational voltage range are floating, pinned, and flat configurations. In this paper, a systematic method for deriving dynamic equation of microcantilevers for all configurations is presented. First, a static study is performed on deflection profile of the microcantilever under electrostatic force. After that, a polynomial approximate shape... 

In this paper, a novel microfabrication process of a six DOF thermal compliant nanopositioner is presented. The microfabrication process was based on bulk micromachining process. By using this process some important operational restrictions which are usually created by surface micromachining were removed. Moreover, this novel process does not need SOI wafers and needs only ordinary wafers. Therefore, it makes microfabrication process cheaper than surface micromachining processes where SOI wafer should be used. This method is completely appropriate for microactuators which have 120 degree misalignment. Finally, a primary test by using interferometer method was used to test connection of... 

A sensitive half-bridge MEMS accelerometer fabricated by sequential and pulsed-mode processes is presented in this paper. The proposed accelerometer is analyzed by using conventional equations and the finite element method. The micromachining technology used in this work relies on two processes: sequential and pulsed-mode. In the sequential deep reactive ion etching process, a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen with a trace value of SF6 is used instead of polymeric material in the passivation step. The pulsed-mode process employs periodic hydrogen pulses in continuous fluorine plasma. Because of the continuous nature of this process, plus the in situ passivation caused by the hydrogen pulses,... 

The aim of this paper is to investigate adhesion property between nano-layered filler and the polymer matrix using a combination of experimental and micromechanical models as well as the changes in yield strength and stiffness of a layered silicate-filled epoxy nanocomposite. The results indicate that addition of intercalated layered silicate particles increased Young's modulus and yield strength of the epoxy resin, although the increases in stiffness and yield strength are modest, 30% and 4%, respectively. In addition, experimental results were compared with predictive stiffening and strengthening models. The rule of mixtures provides an upper bound for the modulus in these materials, while...