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This paper presents a review of the recent advances on micromachined inertial switches/triggers. The review focuses on their advantages and disadvantages, sensitive directions, mechanisms of contact-enhancement, threshold accuracy, and the tunability of the acceleration threshold. Several applications of these sensors are highlighted including in healthcare, structural health monitoring, internet of things, and military. Recent contemporary research directions are also discussed, such as multi-directions/axis, multi-threshold sensors, and machine learning implementation. The article concludes with discussion on future development trends and performance improvements of inertial switches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a typical type of MEMS acceleration sensor, the inertial switch can alter its on-off state while the environmental accelerations satisfy threshold value. An exhaustive summary of the design concept, performance aspects, and fabrication methods of the micro electromechanical system (MEMS) inertial switch is provided. Different MEMS inertial switch studies were reviewed that emphasized acceleration directional and threshold sensitivity, contact characteristics, and their superiorities and disadvantages. Furthermore, the specific fabrication methods offer an applicability reference for the preparation process for the designed inertial switch, including non-silicon surface micromachining technology, standard silicon micromachining technology, and the special fabrication method for the liquid inertial switch. At the end, the main conclusions of the current challenges and prospects about MEMS inertial switches are drawn to assist with the development of research in the field of future engineering applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a typical type of MEMS acceleration sensor, the inertial switch can alter its on-off state while the environmental accelerations satisfy threshold value. An exhaustive summary of the design concept, performance aspects, and fabrication methods of the micro electromechanical system (MEMS) inertial switch is provided. Different MEMS inertial switch studies were reviewed that emphasized acceleration directional and threshold sensitivity, contact characteristics, and their superiorities and disadvantages. Furthermore, the specific fabrication methods offer an applicability reference for the preparation process for the designed inertial switch, including non-silicon surface micromachining technology, standard silicon micromachining technology, and the special fabrication method for the liquid inertial switch. At the end, the main conclusions of the current challenges and prospects about MEMS inertial switches are drawn to assist with the development of research in the field of future engineering applications.

Falls are considered as risky for the elderly people because it may affect the health of the people. So, in the recent years many elderly fall detection methods has been developed. In the present years many fall detection method had been developed but it uses only accelerometer sensor to detect the fall. It may fail in finding in the difference between actual fall and fall like activities such as sitting fast and jumping. In the proposed approach I have suggested a fall detection algorithm to detect the fall of elderly people. Daily human activities are divided into two parts such as static position and dynamic position. With the help of tri-axis accelerometer proposed fall detection can detect four kinds of positions such as falling front, front backward, jumping and sitting fastly. Acceleration and velocity is used to determine kind of fall. Our algorithm uses accelerometer and gyroscope sensor to predict the fall correctly and reduce the false positives and false negatives and increase the accuracy. In addition to that our method is made out of low cost and it can be used in real-time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human-induced vibration has become a serious serviceability problem due to the larger opening of girder, lighter floor systems and longer spans designed and used in practice. Vibration tests were undertaken in laboratory to research the vibrational characteristics of the arch pre-stressed concrete truss (APT) system spanning 16.0 m. Results from ambient vibration, impulse excitations (heel-drop and jumping) and steady-state incentives (walking and running) were presented. Dynamic characteristics such as natural frequencies, damping ratios, mode shapes and acceleration responses were studied and checked against the existing codes. Experimental results show that the investigated APT girder possesses high fundamental frequency and low damping ratio. Moreover, the perception factors based on the root-mean-square acceleration, vibration dose value (VDV) and psychological comfort data were obtained. Lastly, the threshold accelerations and VDVs were suggested for evaluating the human-induced vibration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vestibular otolithic organs are recognized as transducers of head acceleration and they function as such up to their corner frequency or undamped natural frequency. It is well recognized that these organs respond to frequencies above their corner frequency up to the 2–3 kHz range (Curthoys et al., 2016). A mechanics model for the transduction of these organs is developed that predicts the response below the undamped natural frequency as an accelerometer and above that frequency as a seismometer. The model is converted to a transfer function using hair cell bundle deflection. Measured threshold acceleration stimuli are used along with threshold deflections for threshold transfer function values. These are compared to model predicted values, both below and above their undamped natural frequency. Threshold deflection values are adjusted to match the model transfer function. The resulting threshold deflection values were well within in measure threshold bundle deflection ranges. Vestibular Evoked Myogenic Potentials (VEMPs) today routinely uses stimulus frequencies of 500 and 1000 Hz, and otoliths have been established incontrovertibly by clinical and neural evidence as the stimulus source. The mechanism for stimulus at these frequencies above the undamped natural frequency of otoliths is presented where otoliths are utilizing a seismometer mode of response for VEMP transduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Squeeze-film damping and acceleration load are two major issues in the design of inertial micro-switches. In order to deeply and systematically study these two issues, this paper proposes a typical vertically-driven inertial micro-switch, wherein the air and electrode gaps were chosen to design the required damping ratio and threshold value, respectively. The switch was modeled by ANSYS Workbench, and the simulation program was optimized for computational accuracy and speed. Transient analysis was employed to investigate the relationship between the damping ratio, acceleration load, and the natural frequency, and the dynamic properties (including contact bounce, contact time, response time, and threshold acceleration) of the switch. The results can be used as a guide in the design of inertial micro-switches to meet various application requirements. For example, increasing the damping ratio can prolong the contact time of the switch activated by short acceleration duration or reduce the contact bounce of the switch activated by long acceleration duration; the threshold value is immune to variations in the damping effect and acceleration duration when the switch is quasi-statically operated; the anti-jamming capability of the switch can be improved by designing the sensing frequency of the switch to be higher than the acceleration duration but much lower than the other order frequencies of the switch. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article is devoted to a statement of substantive provisions of the method developed by the author of "The seismosteady basis" for an estimation of settlement seismicity of a concrete area taking into account properties composing it soils. For this purpose is used the criterion of dynamic stability of breed - the threshold acceleration based on straight of indicators of a soil. As advantage of an offered method its simplicity and comparative accuracy is marked. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Response time is one of the core attributes for threshold acceleration switches for determining the impact severity. Different from single function inertial switches for only converting circuit states, a wireless inertial microswitch incorporating the bistable flexible mechanism was designed and fabricated using multilayered microelectroforming technology, which can be used for remote detection of both the threshold acceleration and the corresponding response time in severe environments. The threshold snap-through characteristic of the nonlinear bistable mechanism has been introduced to achieve the threshold acceleration sensing capability. The switch mainly consists of one wireless module, one proof mass supported by two pairs of ultralong V-shaped slender beams with the dimension of \(28.0~\mu \) m \(\times 25.0 \mu \) m \(\times 5150.0 \mu \) m, and two contact points for recording triggering times through the high speed sending and receiving wireless module. Then, an accurate design model for analyzing the threshold acceleration and the dynamic response time was established. The 20 repeated experimental results are in good agreement under the same triggering threshold acceleration of 32.38 g, in which, the response time with the traveling distance of \(530.0~\mu \) m is 179.80 ± 0.20 ms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An inertial microswitch with flexible contact-enhanced structure to prolong contact time has been designed and fabricated by surface micromachining technology. The flexible structure is an L-shaped compliant cantilever beam, which can realize elastic deformation during contact process when the movable electrode impacts to the stationary electrode. The influence of applied acceleration loads on contact time and threshold was analyzed, simulated and evaluated. The analysis results indicate that the stiffness of inertial system, amplitude and pulse width of acceleration loads are important influence factors for the contact time: the contact time will be increased along with the increase of acceleration amplitude and the decrease of inertial system stiffness. The broadening of pulse width of acceleration loads will result in a greater value of threshold acceleration and contact time. The simulated results demonstrate that the dynamic properties of designed inertial micro-switch are in agreement with the analytical ones. The fabricated microswitch has been tested by dropping hammer system, the test results indicate that the threshold acceleration is about 110g and the corresponding contact time is about 42 μs when the pulse width is about 1.7 ms. Meanwhile, the contact time increases with the broadening of pulse width. Finally, the fabricated inertial microswitch device has been also tested under applied half-sine wave acceleration with different amplitudes and pulse widths. It is indicated that the contact time does not increase after reaching to a maximum (75 μs under 259g applied acceleration load). From the analysis in the present work, the influence of applied shock loads on contact time and threshold level in an inertial microswitch with flexible contact-enhanced structure is revealed. The conclusions reached in this study provide guidance for future research into the design and fabrication of inertial microswitches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] We firstly propose a bi-directionally tunable MEMS acceleration switch. [•] Threshold decreased from 10.25g to 2.0g by applying tuning voltage. [•] Threshold increased from 10.25g to 17.25g by applying tuning voltage. [•] Additional functionality of safe/armed position convertibility is realized. [•] Additional functionality of mechanical latching is realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Based on surface micromachining technology, a micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) inertia switch with single sensitive direction and reverse impact protection has been designed and fabricated on quartz substrate. The switch is laterally driven (i.e. its sensitive direction is parallel to the substrate plane), in which the conjoined snake springs are used to fix and suspend the movable electrode (i.e. proof mass), and blocks are used to protect the device against reverse impact. The relationship between the threshold acceleration a th and the intrinsic frequency has been investigated by theoretical analysis and finite element simulation, respectively, based on which the geometrical parameters of the switch can be decided to meet design objective. The proof mass thickness H was chosen as a variable, as the micro-fabrication of the device was carried out by low-cost and convenient multi-layer electroplating technology, where H can be easily adjusted while the plane geometry remains the same. The stress distribution of the switch in the contact process was also simulated. Packaged micro-switches were tested by dropping hammer experiments, which generated half-sine wave acceleration as in reality. The measured threshold acceleration generally met the design objective of 60g and the response time was in the order of 10−4 s, both agreed with the simulated results. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The equation of motion of a one way (vertical) spanning strip wall, as an assembly of two rigid bodies, is presented. Only one degree of freedom is needed to completely describe the wall response as the bodies are assumed to be perfectly rectangular and are allowed to rock but not to slide horizontally. Furthermore, no arching action occurs since vertical motion of the upper body is not restrained. Consequently, the equation of motion is nonlinear, with non constant coefficients and a Coriolis acceleration term. Phenomena associated with overburden to self weight ratio, motion triggering, impulsive energy dissipation, amplitude dependency of damping and period of vibration, and scale effect are discussed, contributing to a more complete understanding of experimental observations and to an estimation of system parameters based on the wall characteristics, such as intermediate hinge height and energy damping, necessary to perform nonlinear time history analyses. A comparison to a simple standing, or parapet, wall is developed in order to better highlight the characteristics of this assembly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Separate and non-interfering photo-resist molded metal-electroplating processes have been applied to the fabrication of inertia micro-switches and their wafer-level packaging in sealed cavities. The height of a switch and that of its cavity are independently controlled. The low process temperature allows eventual modular integration of switches on active substrates containing pre-fabricated electronic signal-processing circuits. The scheme also provides leads for electrical access to the sealed devices. The switches were designed using a simple but accurate lumped spring-mass model. With the application of an anti-stiction hydrophobic coating, un-encapsulated switches making over 100 million contacts have been demonstrated in room ambient. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Analytical solution for a non-linear SDOF governing equation of a latch accelerometer. • Energy constraints on the analytical model to define a threshold acceleration g-switch. • Automated SIMULINK model to solve for the design parameters for any arbitrary shock impulse profile. • Comparison between the experimentally obtained displacement response and the analytically obtained displacement response of the proof mass. We present an experimentally verified novel design framework for MEMS g-switch acceleration switches. These switches need to engage a physical latch upon sensing a specified threshold acceleration. It is this physical contact between two surfaces under dynamic conditions that introduces nonlinearity in the system response and makes the task of design optimization difficult. We first find analytical solutions for displacement and velocity of the proof mass by linearizing the friction term using a single degree of freedom model and representing the acceleration profile by a Fourier series. We then use these solutions, along with latching constraints on them, to study how the lumped design parameters – mass, suspension spring stiffness, and latching spring stiffness – vary with increasing threshold acceleration. The latching constraints ensure that latching does not occur for any magnitude of acceleration less than the specified threshold value. Subsequently, we build a g-switch model in SIMULINK that uses the variation in design parameters for a given acceleration profile to find an optimal set of values of design parameters for a specified threshold acceleration. We verify our model by fabricating a latch accelerometer using the parameters obtained from this model for a 60 g threshold acceleration. A shock input of 60 g magnitude and 1.2 ms pulse width is given to the fabricated acceleration switch and the experimental response is recorded using high-speed video images. The analytical response and the experimental response show good agreement. Hence, we believe that this novel design framework can be used to fabricate a latch accelerometer for any arbitrary input shock profile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inertial micro-switches have great potential in the applications of acceleration sensing, due to the integrated advantages of a small size, high integration level, and low or even no power consumption. This paper presents an overview of the recent advancements made in research on the sensitive direction, threshold acceleration, contact effect, and threshold accuracy of inertial micro-switches. The reviewed switches were categorized according to the performance parameters, including multi-directional switches, multi-threshold switches, persistent closed switches, flexible-electrode switches, and low-g high-threshold-accuracy switches. The current challenges and prospects are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]