BOWMEMS

Ultrasound imaging, whether applied to the medical or materials control sectors, is clearly an industrial sector where innovation has become a major challenge for tomorrow’s systems. In this case, it is thanks to the massive arrival of a new generation of ultrasonic components, called MEMS acoustiques (MicroElectromechanical Systems), that we will see the development of compact or even miniature ultrasonic devices allowing, for example, to implement ultra-portable and autonomous systems for medical monitoring or real-time structural control. Acoustic MEMS technology consists of the use as a source of ultrasonic waves of membranes, of micrometric size, which are vibrated at frequencies of the order of MHz. There are two main families of acoustic MEMS, the CMUT type devices (Capacitive Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducers) where the vibration is done by electrostatic forces and the PMUT (Piezoelectric Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducers) where the membranes are actuated by a piezoelectric material of nanometric thickness. Complete control over the manufacture of these devices is clearly an essential element in the value chain of tomorrow’s ultrasound systems. Their manufacture is based on processes derived from microelectronics but requires material means and knowledge specific to MEMS. The aim here, for the GREMAN laboratory and the VERMON company, is to bring together the forces in order to establish, on the CERTeM platform, a semi-industrial production line for these components by Wafer Bonding. The objective, for the VERMON-GREMAN consortium, is clearly to maintain international leadership in this sector of activity, both from an academic and industrial point of view. In view of current know-how, GREMAN aims to integrate this manufacturing process into its core competencies, in addition to the techniques mastered to date based on surface micro-machining. For the company VERMON, this semi-industrial sector, will have to make it possible to carry out work upstream of new products, in order to be able to face, internally, the technological locks installed, with shorter development cycles, and naturally less costly.