Fabrication of Hinged Mirrors Using a Strain-Driven Self-Assembly Method on a GaAs Substrate

Hinged mirror arrays are widely utilized for display applications and optical communication. They can be fabricated by an self-assembly technique using the strain in lattice-mismatched epitaxial layers. A multilayer structure including a strain-compensated layer, a digital alloy sacrificial layer and a strain bilayer, is grown by molecular-beam epitaxy. Self-assembly hinged mirrors on a GaAs substrate have been successfully fabricated by photolithography and selective etching. The hinge fabrication method with a strain bilayer is simple and flexible. Structures formed by multiple hinged plates will enable the self-assembly of more complex three-dimensional microstructures.