The description of friction of silicon MEMS with surface roughness: virtues and limitations of a stochastic Prandtl–Tomlinson model and the simulation of vibration-induced friction reduction

• W. Merlijn van Spengen,
• Viviane Turq and
• Joost W. M. Frenken

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2010, 1, 163–171, doi:10.3762/bjnano.1.20

• sidewall surfaces of a MEMS device flipped upright in on-chip hinges with an AFM (atomic force microscope). The addition of a modulation term to the model allows us to also simulate the effect of vibration-induced friction reduction (normal-force modulation), as a function of both vibration amplitude and

• frequency. The results obtained agree very well with measurement data reported previously. Keywords: MEMS; microscale friction reduction; normal force modulation; stochastic Prandtl–Tomlinson model; surface roughness; Introduction With the invention of the friction force microscope (FFM) by Mate et al. [1

• system to slip, and if it does, less energy is dissipated due to the smaller jumps involved. In [28], we presented the experimental results and a simple analytical model to predict the corresponding friction reduction. The friction measurement as a function of normal force modulation amplitude is