Excerpt from the Proceedings of the COMSOL Users Conference 2006 Birmingham
Finite Element Analysis of Resonant Frequencies in Surface
Acoustic Wave Devices
G. Scheerschmidt*1, K.J. Kirk1 and G. McRobbie2
Microscale Sensors, University of Paisley, 1School of Engineering and Science, 2School of
Computing, Paisley, Scotland, UK
*Corresponding author postal address: School of Engineering and Science, University of Paisley, Paisley,
PA1 2BE, Scotland, UK, email address: guido.scheerschmidt@paisley.ac.uk
Abstract: This document presents a way to
model the resonances for magnetostrictive
Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) devices with the
structural mechanics module of Comsol
Multiphysics. Lamb and surface modes were
identified by simulation of the frequency
response. A first approach was also taken to
introduce damping to the model. The results
from the model were compared to the data from
a real device obtained by two different
measurement methods. Laser vibrometry was
used to measure the surface displacement over
the operating frequency range of the device. A
network analyser was deployed in the frequency
sweep mode to determine the impedance of the
device. The resonances found in the model
corresponding to surface modes agree with the
resonances excited in the real device.
Keywords: Lamb Waves, Resonant Frequency,
Surface Acoustic Wave Devices, Surface
Displacement, Thin Plate
1. Introduction
Surface acoustic waves propagate on the
surface of solids. The velocity of the surface
wave depends on the material parameters such as
elasticity and density. The displacement has a
main component parallel to the plane in direction
of the surface normal [1]. One advantage of
SAWs, which are also known as Rayleigh
waves, is the low attenuation while travelling in
a solid. In addition, they are non-dispersive, this
means the velocity remains constant at different
frequencies. The facts that the wave travels with
a relatively low velocity (order of 103m/s-1),
compared to electromagnetic waves, made them
interesting for signal processing applications as
filters and delay lines could be miniaturised.
Furthermore they are used for wireless
interrogation and sensing applications [2].
Such signal processing components are
called Surface Acoustic Wave devices. They
consist of a piezoelectric substrate with two Inter
Digital Transducers (IDT) on top. The IDT looks
like two interlaced combs Fig. 1(c). If a periodic
electrical signal is applied to an IDT the
electrical energy is converted into mechanical
energy due to the piezoelectric effect. The
material is harmonically stressed and strained.
This gives rise to Surface Acoustic Waves. The
waves travel along the surface toward the second
IDT separated by a few millimetres distance
from the first one. There the mechanical energy
is converted back to electrical energy due to the
reciprocal piezoelectric effect. With the centre to
centre distance - the spacing - between the
elements of an IDT the wavelength can be set
and therefore the operating frequency range.
Piezoelectrically activated SAW devices are
well explored; however it was proposed to
interchange the piezoelectric active material with
magnetostrictive material [3] [4]. Advantages of
the magnetostrictively activated SAW device are
the low temperature film deposition, ease of
fabrication and low voltage operation.
2. The Magnetostictive Micro Device
For the magnetostrictively activated SAW device
two designs are possible, the parallel strip line
Fig. 1(a) and the meander line transducer Fig.
1(b). In other words, it needs to be assured that
an electrical current can flow through the
electrodes. The current generates a periodic
magnetic field around the track. This causes a
periodic magneto-mechanical effect, which
generates the SAW.
 Excerpt from the Proceedings of the COMSOL Users Conference 2006 Birmingham
Figure 1. Illustration of the two possible designs for
magnetic SAW devices, (a) the parallel strip line
transducer, (b) the meander line transducer. The
piezoelectric IDT (c) has same spacing S as magnetic
SAW devices, but half the wavelength.
The magneto-mechanical effect is induced by
the magnetostrictive effect, which is the change
in dimension of a ferromagnetic material by the
presence of a magnetic field [5]. The change of
the shape results from the ordering process of the
dipoles inside the ferromagnetic material due to
the magnetic field as shown in Fig. 2. The stress
and strain resulting from contraction and
expansion is coupled into the substrate. Waves
result from this process. The resulting particle
displacement is maximum at resonance.
Figure 2. Principle of magnetostriction. The dark gray
shape symbolises a magnetic solid. (a) shows solid
with randomly ordered domains. (b) shows aligned
domains in presence of magnetic field. The length
change dl is visible when comparing the two cases.
3. Simulation
Simulation of magnetostriction has been
approached by modeling basic structures of
MEMS such as a magnetostrictive bimorph beam
[6]. However, for magnetostrictively activated
SAW devices the model is more complex.
Therefore simplification was made to investigate
the resonant frequencies of the device. The plane
stress mode from the structural mechanics
module of Comsol Multiphysics was chosen to
analyses the device performance.
Simplification of the real device structure
was taken by permitting the model to be two
dimensional only as shown in Fig. 3 [7]. Further
reduction of the model to the smallest possible
subsection of the device helped to reduce
processing time for the model to be solved.
However, the thickness dimension of the model
represents the real device with 500μm substrate
thickness, 100μm track width, and 300μm
spacing (centre to centre distance of the tracks).
The structure repeats itself at the vertical
boundaries. The rectangular shaped cross-section
was divided into three equally sized sub-
domains, processing the material properties of
silicon. The two upper nodes of the middle
subdomains correspond to the edges of the metal
electrode. To those two nodes harmonic loads in
the plane of the substrate were applied. This
should closely simulate the expansion and
contraction caused by the magneto-mechanical
effect in the magnetic film.
Figure 3. Illustration of the relation of the real device
to the model.
The boundary conditions should allow both
flexural and surface modes. This can be
accomplished by setting constraints in the x-
 Excerpt from the Proceedings of the COMSOL Users Conference 2006 Birmingham

direction for the vertical boundaries of the

model. Internal boundaries between subdomains
as well as the top and bottom boundaries had no (a)
constraints. These boundaries were permitted to
move in x and y direction.
Two analysis types were used.
Eigenfrequency analysis helped to find the
undamped eigenfrequencies and mode of
deformation. The frequency response analysis
solves for the steady state response from
harmonic excitation and uses the Rayleigh model
for frequency dependent damping. Since Comsol
3.3 the package also allows damping to be
modelled using a loss factor, e.g. if Rayleigh (b)
damping coefficients are unknown.
After computing the undamped frequency
response analysis, the modes of deformation
were analysed in the post-processing mode.
Displacement magnitude in x and y directions
were plotted against frequency. Several peaks
were found. Flexural modes were identified at
14.2MHz (A0) and 14.5MHz (S0) as shown in
Fig. 4, and at 17MHz (A1) and 21MHz (S1) as
shown in Fig. 5. The surface modes occur at
28MHz and 58MHz as shown in Fig. 6. Figure 5. (a) A1 mode around 17MHz (b) S1 mode at
21MHz.

(a) (a)

(b) (b)

Figure 4. (a) A0 mode at 14.2MHz (b) S0 mode at

Figure 6. SAW modes (a) around 28MHz
14.5MHz. Model with 300μm centre to centre distance
(wavelength is half the spacing) and (b) around
between metal strips and 500μm silicon substrate.
58MHz (wavelength is a quarter of the spacing).
 Excerpt from the Proceedings of the COMSOL Users Conference 2006 Birmingham

As a surface mode was expected at 16MHz 4. Performance Measurements of SAW

considering v=fλ with λ equal to the spacing of Devices
the metal strips, this surface mode is suppressed.
In fact running the simulation for various The performance of SAW devices can be
substrate thicknesses showed that the A0 and S0 determined by either measuring the impedance
modes converge with increasing substrate of the device or the surface displacement.
thickness and are replaced by a SAW when the The impedance was acquired by deploying a
substrate thickness becomes greater than twice network analyzer. Fig. 9 [7] shows the
the spacing (Fig. 7) [7]. resonances in the frequency range 1-60MHz.
Significant resonances are visible at 9MHz,
300 28MHz and 60MHz. The resonances at 28MHz
substrate thickness [nm]

400
and 60MHz agree with the model and were
500
identified as Rayleigh modes. The resonance at
600 1000 9MHz was found when solving the model with
700 900
the eigenfrequency analysis. This is a symmetric
800 800
700
Lamb wave mode with wavelength twice the
900
600
spacing as shown in Fig. 10.
1000
2000 5
1.00E-06 500
1800
400
disp. in x-
direction

1.00E-09
1600 0
300
Magnitude Impedance |Z0| [Ω]
[a.u.]

1.00E-12

Differential of |Z0| [a. u.]

1400
1.0E+07

1.2E+07

1.4E+07

1.6E+07

1.8E+07

2.0E+07

2.2E+07

1200 -5

1000
Frequency [MHz]
800 -10

600
Figure 7. Influence of substrate thickness on the
occurrence of different flexural modes. 400 -15

200

To estimate the surface displacement the 0 -20

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65
damping needed to be taken into account. An Frequency [MHz]

attempt to obtain the Rayleigh damping Figure 9. Impedance graph for Mu-metal device on
coefficients led to no satisfying results, therefore 500μm silicon substrate with 300μm spacing. Three
a loss factor was introduced to model constant significant resonances are visible. The differential of
damping over the chosen frequency range. Fig. 8 the impedance delivers peaks for weaker resonances.
shows that only two significant resonances
remained, at 14MHz and 28MHz. This meant the
flexural modes were almost suppressed.
1.00E-06
2.4E-09

1.00E-07
disp. amp. y direction [u.a.]

disp. amp. y direction [a.u.]

2.0E-09

1.6E-09 1.00E-08

1.2E-09
1.00E-09

8.0E-10

1.00E-10
4.0E-10

0.0E+00
4 9 14 19 24 29
1.00E-11
Figure 10. Symmetric mode around 9MHz obtainable
Frequency [MHz] using eigenmode analysis. Wavelength is twice the
Figure 8. Comparison between simulation with loss spacing of the device.
factor 0.05 (left bar) and without loss factor (right bar)
for 300μm spacing and 500μm substrate thickness. As a change of the device impedance is not
necessarily related to a change of the
displacement an optical measurement was
 Excerpt from the Proceedings of the COMSOL Users Conference 2006 Birmingham

carried out. Laser vibrometry was used to find
evidence of the surface displacement caused by
the magneto-mechanical effect. The operating
range of the laser vibrometer is limited to
32MHz. However, two significant resonances
were traced at 9MHz and around 28MHz as
shown in Fig. 11 [7]. The form of the graph
resembles the simulation using damping.
0.5
0.45
4. K.A. Ellis, R.B. Dover, T.J. Klemmer and
G.B. Allers, “Magnetically transduced surface
acoustic wave devices”, J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 87,
No. 9, pp. 6304-6306 (2000)
5. D. Jiles, “Introduction to Magnetism and
Magnetic Materials” pp. 98, Chapman and Hall
(1991)
6. J. Dean, M.R.J. Gibbs, T. Schrefl, “Finite-
element analysis on cantilever beam coated with

0.4
magnetostrictive material”, IEEE Transactions
0.35
on Magnetics, Vol. 42, No. 2, pp. 283-288
displacement [nm]

0.3 (2006)
0.25 7. G. Scheerschmidt, K.J. Kirk, G. McRobbie,
0.2 “Investigation of magnetostrictive micro
0.15
devices” IEEE Transactions on Magnetics, under
0.1

0.05
submission (2006)
0
0 5 10 15 20
Frequency [MHz]
25 30
7. Acknowledgements
Figure 11. Displacement curve obtained with laser
vibrometer from Mu-metal sample with 300μm The author would like to thank previous
spacing between metal strips and 500μm thick silicon students involved with fabrication of the devices,
substrate.
especially Susan Turnbull, Sebastian Cwikla and
Graeme Doherty.
5. Conclusions

This paper has shown that the structural

mechanics module of Comsol Multiphysics helps
to predict and identify resonances of magnetic
micro devices with parallel strip transducer
layout. The obtained results from the model
agree with the measured resonances of the real
device using two different measurement
techniques. Surface acoustic modes were
identified at 28MHz and 58MHz. Flexural
modes were identified with respect to different
substrate thicknesses. In addition, the model
helped to predict surface displacement by the use
of a constant loss factor.

6. References

1. J.D.N. Cheeke, “Fundamentals and

Application of Ultrasonic Waves”, p. 144, CRC
Press (2002)
2. L. Reindle, R. Steindl, Ch. Hausleitner, A.
Pohl, G. Scholl, “Wireless passive radio
sensors”, SENSOR 2001, Proc. SENSOR’ 2001,
Vol. 1, pp. 331-336 (2001)
3. F.W. Voltmer, R.M. White, C.W. Turner,
“Magnetostrictive generation of surface elastic
waves” Appl. Phys. Letters, Vol. 15, No. 5, pp.
153-154 (1969)