Piezoelectrically operated actuators by quartz micromachining for optical application

We report the new type of a monolithic quartz actuator which is fabricated by anisotropic etching and operated through piezoelectric effect at resonant frequency. The quartz actuators with large displacement have no been developed because quartz has small piezoelectric constants compared to other materials such as PZT. However, we proved that a smart mechanism enabled us to have a large displacement up to 200 microns with a millimeter size suspended actuator using the piezoelectricity of quartz. As examples, we fabricated bellows type actuators and optical choppers, and measured their mechanical characteristics. We also showed that the bellows type actuator could displace a small object statically by hitting it repeatedly. This woodpecker motion can be applied to move the small optical component such as a mirror and prism to switch the path of light.