Micromachined circuit elements driven by micromachined DC-to-DC converter on a common substrate

摘要

The present invention comprises the combination of one or more micromachined circuit elements and a micromachined DC-to-DC step-up converter on the same or different substrates, so as to allow the operation of the micromachined circuit element at a different voltage, typically a higher or a negative voltage, in comparison to the input power supply to the system. The micromachined structure of such a converter requires little chip area and is normally fully compatible with the micromachined structure of other micromachined circuit elements, such switches and resonators, providing obvious advantages when formed on the same substrate as such devices. Similarly, micromachined switches have the advantage of providing substantially greater isolation between the signal being switched and the signal doing the switching, and provide a much better ratio between the off resistance to the on resistance than can be achieved with transistor switching devices, such as by way of example, MOS switches. Micromachined resonators also offer many advantages, such as an equivalent of tuned circuits with very high Q factor, and do so without requiring inductors or active devices in oscillatory circuits having a risk of instability, and of allowing the realization of the equivalent of complicated tuned circuits in a small chip area.