Important Process in Micro-System Technology

IL LIGA, AN IMPORTANT PROCESS IN MICRO-SYSTEM TECHNOLOGY 

Microelectronics became a reality with the invention of the transistor and the advent of the space age that necessitated drastic scaling down. Electronics had until tliat time employed techniques and methods some of wliiclr in principle, are still used in some branches of engineering. Specifically, circuit components were combined on a circuit board in accordance with a pre-designed assembly plan. As we are discussing here the period before micro- 

Fortunately, it is found possible also to apply the methods of microelectronics to, for example, mechanics, optics, fluidics, and, finally, chemistiy or biochemistiy. Systems may thus be designed with extreme functional density and powered at costs which do decrease by orders of magnitude year by year. The recognition of this prospect was the main reason why methods of manufacturing micro-patterns were devised, and these micro-patterns were combined in micro-systems. Thus, one may state that microelectronics should be considered as the source from wliich micro-systems engineering sprung. From the start it was clear that, even though a 

In the course of this development, avenues for micro-pattern production based on microelectronics opened, perhaps not in detail, but in die basic underlying concepts. 

An important and interesting alternative to silicon micromechanics is tire so-called LIGA (German abbreviation of tire tlrree major process steps, see bellow) process. It was initially developed at the Institute of Microstructure Technology of tire Research Center in Karlsruhe. Genrrany. In this techrrique, the material used is 

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