{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T00:35:18Z","timestamp":1760142918255,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":25,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"2","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2024,1,11]],"date-time":"2024-01-11T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1704931200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada","award":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"]}]},{"name":"Mitacs (Canada)","award":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"]}]},{"name":"Manitoba Hydro International (Winnipeg, Canada)","award":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["RGPIN-05019-2022","IT17156"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Sensors"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Micromachined electric field mills have received much interest for the measurement of DC fields; however, conventional designs with lateral moving shutters could have shutter lifting in the presence of strong fields, which affects their performance. This paper presents a MEMS electric field mill utilizing a vertical movement shutter to address this issue. The sensor is designed and fabricated based on a flexible PCB substrate and is released using a laser-cutting process. The movement of the shutter is driven by an electrostatic actuator. When the driving signal is a sine wave, the shutter moves in the same direction during both the positive and negative half-periods. This facilitates the application of a lock-in amplifier to synchronize with the signal at twice the frequency of the driving signal. In experimental testing, when the vertical shutter is driven at a resonance of 840 Hz, the highest sensitivity of the sensor is achieved and is measured to be 5.1 V\/kVm\u22121. The sensor also demonstrates a good linearity of 1.1% for measuring DC electric fields in the range of 1.25 kV\/m to 25 kV\/m.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/s24020439","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2024,1,11]],"date-time":"2024-01-11T03:21:41Z","timestamp":1704943301000},"page":"439","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["A Flexible Printed Circuit Board Based Microelectromechanical Field Mill with a Vertical Movement Shutter Driven by an Electrostatic Actuator"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"24","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0000-0690-4252","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Tao","family":"Chen","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB R3T 5V6, Canada"}]},{"given":"Cyrus","family":"Shafai","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB R3T 5V6, Canada"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2024,1,11]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"4173","DOI":"10.1049\/iet-gtd.2019.1413","article-title":"Ground-level DC electric field sensor for overhead HVDC\/HVAC transmission lines in hybrid corridors","volume":"14","author":"Cui","year":"2020","journal-title":"IET Gener. 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