Abstract: A microelectromechanical (MEM) device for redirecting incident light is disclosed. The MEM device utilizes a pair of electrostatic actuators formed one above the other from different stacked and interconnected layers of polysilicon to move or tilt an overlying light-reflective plate (i.e. a mirror) to provide a reflected component of the incident light which can be shifted in phase or propagation angle. The MEM device, which utilizes leveraged bending to provide a relatively-large vertical displacement up to several microns for the light-reflective plate, has applications for forming an electrically-programmable diffraction grating (i.e. a polychromator) or a micromirror array.

Abstract: An actively controlled flexural plate wave device provides a micro-scale pump. A method of actively controlling a flexural plate wave device produces traveling waves in the device by coordinating the interaction of a magnetic field with actively controlled currents. An actively-controlled flexural plate wave device can be placed in a fluid channel and adapted for use as a micro-scale fluid pump to cool or drive micro-scale systems, for example, micro-chips, micro-electrical-mechanical devices, micro-fluid circuits, or micro-scale chemical analysis devices.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for measuring particle agglomeration or dispersion in fluid mixtures, such as polymer melts, resides in a piezoelectric transducer, a spherical fused quartz lens, and a fluid housing. A repetitive, broadband, ultrasonic wave is produced by the transducer and is sent into the lens, which also serves to isolate the transducer from the mixture. The ultrasonic wave meets a spherical dimple at the end of the lens which focuses a portion of it into a diffraction limited spot or "interrogation zone". Since the intensity of the wave is large in the interrogation zone, small changes in the impedance of the fluid in this zone, caused by passing agglomerates, will cause large fluctuations in the intensity of the back scattered wave, which is monitored by the transducer between pulses and displayed by associated electronic elements.