Piezoelectric MEMS for Sensors, Actuators and Energy Harvesting

Examples of piezoelectric MEMS (micro-electromechanical systems) developed to work as sensors, actuators and energy harvesting devices are presented. Specifically, a distance-independent contactlessly-interrogated piezoelectric microresonator has been developed to operate as a microbalance. Acoustic-wave piezoelectric microactuators have been investigated to centrifugate liquid drops in acoustofluidics applications and to operate as tunable sound transducers. A piezoelectric MEMS energy harvester which combines the multi-converter and nonlinear approaches has been proposed.