Abstract
A new on-chip tensile testing device using electrostatic actuation and detection was designed and fabricated from an SOI wafer to evaluate the mechanical properties of carbon nano materials such as carbon nano-tubes and fullerenes. In this device, force is generated by electrostatic comb drive actuator and tensile force on specimen is measured as the deformation of force-measuring spring. The specimen elongation and the spring deformation are detected as capacitance changes. As a result of design, we predicted high resolution of elongation and tensile force, which are 1nm and 1nN respectively. In order to assemble carbon nano-material on this device, a new technique for fabricating a free-standing fullerene nano-wire was proposed. This wire was fabricated using electron beam writing and sacrificial dry etching. By irradiated vacuum-deposited fullerene thin film with electron beam, polymerized fullerene nano-wires were patterned. Then, the doubly-supported beam structure of the fullerene nano-wire was obtained by sacrificial dry etching using XeF_2 gas.
