February 28, 2008 — PI (Physik Instrumente) L.P., which manufactures nanopositioning and precision motion-control equipment for semiconductor and photonics applications, has extended its PIHera family of flexure-guided piezo nanopositioning stages, now offering record travel ranges to 1.8 mm.
These precision closed-loop flexure-guided stages can be used for scanning probe applications (surface metrology) and static positioning. Due to their long travel ranges, they can scan areas more than 200 times larger than conventional piezo stages with typical ranges of 100×100 microns.
Most PIHera stages provide subnanometer resolution and even the 1.8 mm versions achieve 3 nm resolution in closed-loop operation. The compact size is achieved with a new, friction-free and extremely stiff flexure system, which also provides fast response and excellent guiding accuracy, the company said in a news release.
Trajectory precision is in the low-nanometer range. High acceleration forces are provided by patented, long-life multilayer piezoelectric linear actuators. The ability to control motion with millisecond responsiveness and nanometer precision over long travel ranges makes PIHera stages ideal for measuring and QA applications, the company said.
These little devices are really cool to me. I remember growing up reading books about nano-robots. So far, this technology is on the right track for making that happen. Even the small improvements that the article mentions here about the stages improving their range is another step in making them better.