A MEMS dynamic mechanical analyzer for in situ viscoelastic characterization of 3D printed nanostructures

Cellular, metamaterial structures with sub-micron features have shown the ability to become excellent energy absorbing materials for impact mitigation due to the enhanced mechanical properties of materials at the nanoscale. However, in order to optimize the design of these energy absorbing metamaterial structures we need to be able to measure the dynamic properties of the sub-micron features such as storage and loss moduli and the loss factor. Therefore, at-scale testing is required to capture the scale, temperature, and strain rate dependent material properties of these nanoscale materials. This thesis presents the design, fabrication, and calibration of a MEMS-based dynamic mechanical analyzer (DMA) that can be directly integrated with the two-photon lithography (TPL) process commonly used to fabricate metamaterial structures with nanoscale features. The MEMS-based DMA consists of a chevron style thermal actuator used to generate a tensile load on the structure and two differential capacitive sensors on each side of the structure used to measure load and displacement. This design demonstrated 1.5 ± 0.75 nm displacement resolution and 104 ± 52 nN load resolution, respectively. Dynamic mechanical analysis was successfully conducted on a single nanowire feature printed between the load and displacement stages of the MEMS device with testing frequencies ranging between 0.01 – 10 Hz and testing temperatures ranging between 22°C - 47°C. These initial tests on an exemplar TPL part demonstrate that the printed nanowire behaves as a viscoelastic material wherein the transition from glassy to viscous behavior has already set in at the room temperature.