CAREER: Toward Smart Surface Acoustic Wave Devices with Gate-Tunability

职业：开发具有栅极可调谐性的智能表面声波器件

• 批准号: 2337069
• 负责人: Chen Shen
• 金额: $ 50万
• 依托单位: Rowan University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-05-01 至 2029-04-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2337069&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Toward; Smart; Surface; Acoustic

Surface acoustic waves (SAWs) are a type of sound waves that propagate at the surface of elastic solids. They carry important information and can interact with piezoelectric substrates, which together lead to a wide range of applications including filtering, analog signal processing, and quantum acoustic devices. However, most of the SAW devices have fixed configurations and limited tunability, and their properties cannot be manipulated in real-time. Such a drawback limits the ability of current electronic devices that use SAW as a fundamental platform. It represents a major barrier to achieving smart and intelligent control of SAWs, which is a pursuit in the information era. This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) proposal aims to overcome this technological gap by developing and optimizing tunable SAW components that go beyond passive, single-functionality devices. Specifically, it allows for convenient and reconfigurable tuning of SAWs by supplying a small gate voltage. This research will enhance the fundamental understanding of SAWs propagating on piezoelectric substrates and realize monolithic smart SAW kernels that can be applied in various scenarios to ultimately enable intelligent integrated devices for sensing, communication, and biomedical applications. The program will also help mitigate barriers to high-quality STEM education through the partnership with local community colleges. It will advance the education and research experience of students at all levels, especially those from underrepresented groups to cultivate and retain them in the STEM fields.The objective of this proposal is to develop novel integrated SAW devices with expanded functionality and tunability by harnessing the electro-acoustic effects. To achieve this, theoretical and numerical models will be established to quantify the piezoelectric and electromechanical couplings from a microscopic wave-matter interaction perspective. New tuning mechanisms with gate-tunable features will be identified based on both linear and nonlinear effects arising from SAW propagation. The material, configuration, and fabrication process associated with these tuning approaches will be systematically tested and optimized with the goal of reducing the voltage requirement and response time. Experimental measurements will be performed to demonstrate tunable SAW propagation with improved performance, capacity, and bandwidth. The developed tunable SAW component will serve as a smart kernel, which will be coupled with control circuits as well as other supporting hardware to realize intelligent and multi-functional integrated on-chip devices. The applicability of the proposed approach will be validated in a number of scenarios such as reconfigurable filtering, multi-functional sensing, and programmable SAW-based particle manipulation. The research will contribute to the development of next-generation smart SAW devices by providing a powerful approach that promotes a fundamental understanding of electrically induced elasticity modulation as well as gate-tunable components that can be integrated into diverse systems.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

表面声波（SAW）是一种在弹性固体表面传播的声波。它们携带着重要的信息，可以与压电基板相互作用，共同导致了广泛的应用，包括滤波，模拟信号处理和量子声学器件。然而，大多数SAW器件具有固定的配置和有限的可调谐性，并且它们的特性不能被实时操纵。这样的缺点限制了使用SAW作为基本平台的当前电子设备的能力。它是实现智能化和智能化控制的主要障碍，这是信息时代的追求。该学院早期职业发展（CAREER）提案旨在通过开发和优化超越无源单一功能器件的可调谐SAW元件来克服这一技术差距。具体地，它允许通过提供小的栅极电压来方便地和可重新配置地调谐SAW。这项研究将增强对SAW在压电基板上传播的基本理解，并实现单片智能SAW内核，可应用于各种场景，最终实现传感，通信和生物医学应用的智能集成器件。该计划还将通过与当地社区学院的合作，帮助减轻高质量STEM教育的障碍。它将提高各级学生的教育和研究经验，特别是那些来自代表性不足的群体的学生，以培养和留住他们在STEM领域。该提案的目标是开发新型集成SAW器件，通过利用电声效应扩展功能和可调谐性。为了实现这一点，理论和数值模型将建立量化的压电和机电耦合从微观波-物质相互作用的角度来看。新的调谐机制与门可调功能将被确定的基础上所产生的SAW传播的线性和非线性效应。与这些调谐方法相关的材料，配置和制造工艺将进行系统测试和优化，以降低电压要求和响应时间。将进行实验测量，以证明可调谐SAW传播与改进的性能，容量和带宽。所开发的可调谐SAW元件将作为智能内核，与控制电路以及其他支持硬件耦合，实现智能化和多功能的集成片上器件。所提出的方法的适用性将被验证在一些情况下，如可重构滤波，多功能传感，可编程SAW为基础的粒子操作。该研究将有助于下一代智能SAW器件的开发，提供一种强有力的方法，促进对电致弹性调制以及可集成到不同系统中的门可调元件的基本理解。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。