Electrostatic force coupling of MEMS oscillators for spectral vibration measurements

Within this paper we present a new microsystem for frequency selective vibration monitoring in the frequency range below 1 kHz. The novel sensor is based on two force coupled oscillators, operating at standard pressure, which transform the low frequency vibration signal into a high frequency oscillation of a mechanical resonator. The resonator filters the desired spectral line by means of resonance amplification in a very small band. For the transformation we made use of the superheterodyne principle, known from communications engineering.