Special issue on DTIP 2014

This Special Issue is composed by seven papers, selected and expanded from the contributions presented at the 2014 DTIP Symposium on MEMS and MOEMS (Design, Test, Integration & Packaging of MEMS/MOEMS), held in Cannes, Cote d’Azur on 1–4 April 2014. It was a successful experience in the now long history of the DTIP Symposium, chaired by Bernard COURTOIS, CMP, Grenoble, France, with the significant contribution of the Vice General Chair Pascal NOUET, LIRMM, Montpellier, France and the Co-Chair Jean Michel KARAM, MEMSCAP, Bernin, France. This edition of the Symposium ended with the passing of the baton between Bernard Courtois, who diligently and with great efficiency has played the role of organizer of the event since 1999, and Pascal Nouet, which will continue in the role of Chair from 2015 onwards. So far, first of all the Editor conveys special thanks to Bernard for his continuous and valuable efforts for the past years and good luck to Pascal for the future and successful organization of the DTIP Symposium. Last, but not least, I would like to thank Prof. Yoshio Mita, from the University of Tokyo, Japan, for helping me as a Co-Chair in the CAD conference organization. Technical areas covered by the CAD Conference of DTIP 2014, from which the papers belonging to this special issue have been selected, span from DC to RF applications including technological efforts, mechanical nonlinear properties and nano-characterization of the exploited device configurations. In detail: The first paper: ‘‘Real-Time Characterization of Dielectric Charging in Contactless Capacitive MEMS’’, by Manuel Dominguez-Pumar et al., presents a new method to characterize the dynamics of the charge trapped in the dielectric layer of contactless microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). For sampled-time systems, this allows knowing the state of the net charge at each sampling time without distorting the measurement. The second paper ‘‘Analysis of the adhesion effect in RF-MEMS switches using atomic force microscope’’, by Corina Birleanu and Marius Pustan, is an investigation of the adhesion effect on the mechanical response of MEMS components for RF switch application by using an atomic force microscope (AFM). The occurrence and strength of adhesion effects in MEMS devices depend on a variety of environmental, geometrical and operational parameters, carefully discussed in this contribution. The third paper ‘‘Resonant Behavior Study of PZT Sensor Partially Immersed in Liquid Using PSO Method: Modeling and Experiment’’, by Mahnaz Shamshirsaz and Mohammad Maroufi, is an analysis of resonant piezoelectric-excited millimeter-sized cantilevers (PEMCs) in applications such as liquid level and density sensing. In this work, a PEMC is designed and fabricated to be used as a liquid level sensing platform. An analytical model is developed and applied to evaluate the behavior of this device with respect to different tip immersion depths. The fourth paper ‘‘Analysis and Design of an Electrostatic MEMS Microphone using the PolyMUMPs Process’’, by Owen Casha et al., is the analysis and design of an electrostatic MEMS microphone using the PolyMUMPs process with an additional back-etch processing step. Circular and square (simply supported and clamped) diaphragm designs are considered and analyzed, with the R. Marcelli (&) Institute for Microelectronics and Microsystems (CNR-IMM Roma), National Research Council of Italy, Via del Fosso del Cavaliere, 100 00133 Rome, Italy e-mail: Romolo.Marcelli@cnr.it