Experimental and mathematical analysis of a piezoelectrically actuated multilayered imperfect microbeam subjected to applied electric potential

In this paper we propose to fabricate a microcantilever beam actuator using thin layer PZT material. The multilayered microbeam is initially curved due to fabrication process. The device is also modeled using a the Euler-Bernoulli beam theory and takes into account the multilayer structure of the device. The inclusion of these imperfection into the theoretical model generates geometric nonlinearities. Static and dynamic experimental analysis is conducted to examine the physiomechanical behavior of the considered microstructure. To this end, The model is first compared and validated with experimental findings for an applied constant voltage. Very good agreement depicts the accuracy of the proposed mathematical model. When time varying voltage is applied, the nonlinear differential equation is solved using a perturbation technique. Again good agreement with experiments are found. Finally, a parametric study is carried out to explore the influences of different parameters on the frequency response of the piezoelectrically actuated imperfect microbeams.