Experimental study of the effect of hydrodynamic coupling of micro-cantilever array on the dynamic response of micro-cantilever

This study experimentally investigates the effect of hydrodynamic coupling of a micro-cantilever array on the dynamic response of a micro-cantilever. The micro-cantilever array consists of three harmonically driven micro-cantilevers dynamically coupled through air flow. The right cantilever and left cantilever (auxiliary-cantilevers) adjacent to the middle cantilever (operating-cantilever) are exploited to generate hydrodynamic force to change the air damping of operating-cantilever. Thus, the quality factor of operating-cantilever can be controlled by changing the phase and magnitude of excitation force on auxiliary-cantilevers, and varying the gap between auxiliary-cantilevers and operating-cantilever. In the experiment, magnetic actuated micro-cantilever arrays were fabricated and characterized. Measurements show the variation of quality factor of operating-cantilever is from −39% to +27%.