Investigating flow induced mechanics of strain-engineered microcantilevers integrated in a flow-through system

In this work we report the fabrication of stress-driven curled-up microcantilevers based on a metal-oxide bilayer design and their mechanical characterization in a flow-through system. Microcantilever arrays are realized by using conventional micromachining techniques involving optical lithography and etching processes. Due to the geometry of the out-of-plane curled cantilever, the load applied by the fluid flow is distributed along its body. These cantilevers demonstrated mechanical robustness at flow velocities of 0.48–5.7 mm/s and drag forces of 0.35–4.23 µN when tested with glycerol. This fluid-driven approach enables us to measure multiple structures at once and get statistics on their mechanical performance, durability, and applicability in different devices.