Patent ID: 8459093

Claim:
A microelectromechanical gyroscope, comprising: a body; a sensing mass, elastically coupled to the body and movable with respect to the body according to a degree of freedom in response to rotations of the body about a sensing axis; a self-test actuator configured to produce a self-test signal, the self-test actuator including: a modulator having a first input configured to receive a base-band signal and a second input configured to receive a carrier signal, the modulator being configured to generate the self-test signal by modulation of the carrier signal with the base-band signal; a capacitive coupling that couples the self-test actuator to the sensing mass and is configured to apply, in response to a self-test signal from the self-test actuator, electrostatic forces to move the sensing mass in accordance with the degree of freedom and at an actuation frequency; and a sensing device configured to sense transduction signals indicative of displacements of the sensing mass according to the degree of freedom, and to discriminate, in the transduction signals, spectral components corresponding to the actuation frequency and spectral components indicative of motion of the sensing mass caused by the rotation of the body, the sensing device including: a signal demodulator having a demodulation input configured to receive the carrier signal and a transduction signal input coupled to the sensing mass and configured to receive the transduction signals, the signal demodulator being configured to generate first demodulated signals by demodulation of the transduction signals with the carrier signal; and a self-test demodulator having a signal input coupled to the signal demodulator and configured to receive the first demodulated signals and a demodulation input configured to receive the base-band signal, the self-test demodulator being configured to generate second demodulated signals by demodulation of the first demodulated signals with the base-band signal.