Micro/Nanomechanical Devices: Introduction

This lecture introduces the course ME-426 on Micro/Nanomechanical Devices, covering the objectives, fabrication techniques, transduction principles, and key concepts like nonlinearity, stress, and thermomechanical noise. It emphasizes the benefits of reducing device size and the challenges of commercial MEMS and NEMS systems. Practical matters such as the course schedule, materials, and workload are also discussed, along with the exam format and important take-home messages on scaling laws, fabrication, transduction, force/stress, dynamical behavior, noise, and eigenmodes.