A novel MEMS optical gyroscope

This paper proposed an innovative design of micro optic gyroscope based on MEMS structures and optic interferometric micro-displacement measurement.,The gyroscope consists of micro vibrator and interferometric read-out. Using Coriolis force, the vibrator transfers the system rotation into a forced vibration, the induced vibration can be sensed by the interferometric micro-displacement measurement system. The optic measurement system has two mirrors which reflects two rays into a detector. The paper has done comprehensive studies on the formulation and analysis of the proposed gyroscope, two key sensor equations have been derived in the first time : 1) Relation between rotation and phase deference of two rays Delta phi = 4 pi l(0)/lambda+8 pi/lambda (x)maxQ(y)/omega(y)Omega(t)sin(omega(d)t); 2) Relation between rotation and interferometric intensity of light I(t) approximate to 8 pi/lambda (x)maxQ(y)/omega(y)Omega(t)sin(omega(d)t)sin(4 pi l(0)/lambda). A comparison of the proposed gyroscope with well-know Sagnac formulation has been investigated, and it is shown that the proposed model is much better than Sagnac ones, since the new model has nothing with very long fiber in the case of Sagnac gyroscope. The innovative model gives a new hope to fabricate high accurate and cheaper gyroscope.