SiC TAPS (Temperature, Acceleration, Pressure and Strain) Sensors for Extreme Harsh Environments

This proposal describes a three-phase program to deliver silicon carbide (SiC) TAPS sensors for extreme harsh environments that are capable of measuring temperature, acceleration, pressure, and strain under large temperature excursions (600 C), high-g forces (100,000g), and in the presence of corrosive and erosive media (wet steam and/or hydrocarbon engine exhaust). This SiC TAPS sensor system is unique in that SiC semiconductor substrate is integrated with SiC MEMS structures and both of these, in turn, are integrated with SiC encapsulation. The proposed SiC TAPS sensor system will be highly versatile and simple to incorporate in larger systems, enabling new military and civilian capabilities, for example, bomb damage assessments sensors, sensor carrier projectiles, sensors for all electric weaponry systems, guided munitions control sensors, jet engine sensors, automotive and gas turbine engine sensor, military wheeled and tracked vehicles to list a few. It is important to emphasize that sensor performance in the extreme environment is possible only by using an integrated all-SiC technology for 1) electronics, 2) sensor structures as well as 3) packaging because only silicon carbide possesses the requisite, unique material properties to survive such harsh environments. To accomplish all of the above tasks, a dual thrust research project is proposed. In part One (1) the silicon carbide technology is developed in three phases and in part (2) that technology is applied to specific sensor designs. Specifically, in part One (1) a complete family of three distinct SiC deposition processes will be developed and refined, each with a different deposition temperature range. In this way, SiC electronics can be topped with SiC resonator structures, and in turn, topped by SiC encapsulation. The deposition temperatures of the three SiC deposition processes are staged (1200-1600 C, 750-850 C, 200-450 C) so that the deposition process of each successive layer does not violate the thermal budget of the layer(s) below. In part Two (2) a new set of environmentally-hard, SiC-based integrated MEMS temperature, acceleration, pressure and strain sensor components and SiC electronic will be designed, fabricated, integrated, and tested. To overcome the technological challenges of developing such a sensor module, proposed project has divides in to for major tasks (1) Development of harsh environment compatible of driving and sensing electronics; (2) Design and fabrication of harsh environment sensors; (3) Development of harsh environment compatible encapsulation (3) Integration of all sensors onto electronic flat form; (4) Development of harsh environment compatible encapsulation. To date, this is the first-ever comprehensive effort towards integrated fabrication for realizing SiC sensors on SiC electronics.