Design and dynamics of a 3-DOF flexure-based parallel mechanism for micro/nano manipulation

This paper presents the mechanical design and dynamics of a 3-DOF (degree of freedom) flexure-based parallel mechanism. Flexure hinges are used as the revolute joints to provide smooth and high accurate motion with nanometer level resolution. Three piezoelectric actuators are utilized to drive active links of the flexure-based mechanism. The inverse dynamics of the proposed mechanism is established by simplifying flexure hinges into ideal revolute joints with constant torsional stiffnesses. Finite element analysis is used to validate the performance of the proposed 3-DOF flexure-based parallel mechanism. The interaction between the actuators and the flexure-based mechanism is extensively investigated based on the established model. Experiments are carried out to verify the dynamic performance of the 3-DOF flexure-based mechanism.