ACCELERATION SENSOR ELEMENT AND METHOD OF ITS MANUFACTURE

摘要

A flexure transducer which is used for the detection of an applied acceleration comprising (1) a frame having an upper surface and a lower surface, (2) a sheet member which has a plurality of flexible parts and a center part and whose flexible parts are extended between at least a part of the inner edge of the frame and the center part and are integrally continuous with them, (3) a weight which has a neck part integrally connected to the center part of the sheet member and is hung from the sheet member through the neck part and (4) a support member which supports the lower surface of the frame and whose inner surface faces the side surface of the weight with a first gap therebetween, a second gap being continuous with the first gap, and defined between the flexible parts of the sheet member and the weight, a third gap being defined between the frame and the sheet member and/or inside the sheet member, the frame and the sheet member being joined to each other and the sheet member and the weight being joined to each other in such a manner that, when an acceleration is applied to the transducer, at least two flexible parts are elastically deformed and, as a result, the weight is displaced relatively to the frame, the weight and the support member being formed of a semiconductor substrate, the 2nd gap being formed by removing a sacrifice layer which is provided in the semiconductor substrate and the frame and the sheet member comprising epitaxial layers provided on the semiconductor substrate.