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Updated: May 23, 2026

Characterization of Thermal Transport in One-dimensional Solid Materials
Published on: January 26, 2014
Comparison between conduction and convection effects on self-heating in doped microcantilevers
Mohd Zahid Ansari1, Chongdu Cho
1Department of Mechanical Engineering, Inha University, 253 Yonghyun-dong, Nam-Ku, Incheon 402-751, Korea. ansari.zahid@hotmail.com
None:
The present study investigates the effects of thermal conduction and convection on self-heating temperatures and bimetallic deflections produced in doped microcantilever sensors. These cantilevers are commonly used as sensors and actuators in microsystems. The cantilever is a monolith, multi-layer structure with a thin U-shaped element inside. The cantilever substrate is made of silicon and silicon dioxide, respectively, and the element is p-doped silicon. A numerical analysis package (ANSYS) is used to study the effect of cantilever substrate material, element width, applied voltage and the operating environments on cantilever characteristics. The numerical results for temperature are compared against their analytical models. Results indicate the numerical results are accurate within 6% of analytical, and Si/Si cantilevers are more suitable for biosensors and AFM, whereas, Si/SiO(2) are for hotplates and actuators applications.
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