A surface micromachined tunable film bulk acoustic resonator

This paper reports on the design, modeling, fabrication and measurement of a novel-structured film bulk acoustic resonator (FBAR) that allows frequency tuning by MEMS actuation. FBAR's are micromachined frequency controlling devices working in RF regime. For many applications, a small range of tuning is desired to cope with drifts from different origins. To realize this functionality, it has been suggested to place tunable elements such as variable capacitors or inductors in the circuit. A conventional approach, in which an external element is used, would introduce parasitics and might seriously degrade the quality factor of the system. In contrast, our work integrates the piezoelectric resonating film and the tuning element to build a compact structure. By reducing possible parasitics and electrical resistance, this structure enables frequency tuning while maintaining a high quality factor.