title: Capacitive displacement sensor for detecting planar submicrometer motion.
abstract: This paper describes the design of a very simple displacement sensor that measures the change in the position of an object by sensing the change in capacitance due to the movement of this object in the sensor fringing electric field. Two sensor geometries with small footprints were considered and several sensor variations were built and tested. At distances of approximately 0.5 μm and 30 μm, test results demonstrated that the sensors' resolution was in the order of tens of nanometers.
authors.affiliation: Weapons and System Department United States Naval Academy, 105 Maryland Avenue, Annapolis, Maryland 21402, USA.
authors.forename: Svetlana
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Avramov-Zamurovic
authors.affiliation: Applied Materials, Santa Clara, California 95054, USA.
authors.forename: Jae Myung
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Yoo
authors.affiliation: Intelligent System Division, Engineering Laboratory, National Institute of Standards and Technology, 100 Bureau Dr., Gaithersburg, Maryland 20899, USA.
authors.forename: Nicholas G
authors.initials: NG
authors.lastname: Dagalakis