MICROFABRICATED FLIPPING GLASS DISC FOR
STEREO IMAGING IN ENDOSCOPIC VISUAL INSPECTION
Wook Choi1, Minoo Akbarian2, Vladimir Rubtsov2 and Chang-Jin “CJ” Kim1
1
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
2
Intelligent Optical Systems, Inc. (IOS), Torrance, CA, U.S.A.
ABSTRACT
In many fields, including medical and manufacturing,
endoscopy is a powerful tool for remote visual inspection.
However, images obtained by an endoscope are mostly
planar and provide no accurate size or distance information
about the object of interest. Use of stereo images to solve
these problems greatly increases the performance of such
inspection tools due to its three dimensional measurability.
In this study, a method to obtain stereo images using a
single “flipping” glass disc device for endoscopic
applications, and its realization into a miniaturized device
are presented.
1. INTRODUCTION
Endoscopy is a powerful tool for remote visual
inspection in difficult-to-access areas and widely used in
industrial and medical fields. It is mainly used for
non-destructive inspection of machinery or minimally
invasive diagnosis on body organs. However, most of such
endoscopes, e.g., endoscopic crack inspection tools for
quality assurance in industry, are able to obtain only planar
images, with which size and distance information of
objects of interest cannot be read easily. To overcome such
limitations and improve the overall optical inspection
performances of the endoscopic tools, stereo imaging
methods using single lens [1]-[4] and multiple lens systems
[5]-[7] have been introduced with more accurate evaluation
capabilities. Such stereo images are used for precise
measurement and three dimensional reconstruction of the
object of interest using various triangulation techniques,
which is never possible with the planar images.
In this study, a stereo imaging method using a single
electrostatically “flipping” transparent plate is introduced
for endoscopic applications. Design, fabrication, and
operation of the microdevice that implements the imaging
method are reported.
2. PRINCIPLE
The proposed stereo image generation utilizes
refraction of light when the light passes through two
different media, explained by Snell’s law. Figure 1
illustrates the stereo image generation by a single
transparent flipping plate without using multiple lenses, as
in [3]. As the transparent plate tilts counterclockwise or
Figure 1: Image shift achieved by plate tilting. Due to
the refraction of light, the image of an object shifts up or
down by tilting the transparent plate.
978-1-4244-2978-3/09/$25.00 ©2009 IEEE
(a) (b) (c)
Figure 2: Demonstration of how to measure the distance
from image shift. A 14 cm-long pen and a 4.5 cm-long
AAA battery are seen through a 2.5 cm-thick Plexiglas®
plate. (a) When the plate is still. (b) When the plate tilts
forward, and (c) when the plate tilts backward. As the
transparent plate tilts, the image of the closer object
shifts more.
clockwise, the image of an object shifts up or down,
respectively, due to the refraction of light when passing
through the tilted plate. The amount of the image shift is
determined by the index of refraction, tilting angle and
thickness of the transparent plate, and can be calculated by
⎛ ⎞
⎜ ⎟
⎜ 1 − sin 2 θ ⎟
ΔL = t sin θ ⎜1 − 2
⎟ (1)
⎜ ⎛ n2 ⎞ ⎟
⎜⎜ ⎜⎜ ⎟⎟ − sin θ ⎟2
⎝ n1 ⎠ ⎟
⎝ ⎠
where t is the thickness of the tilting plate, θ is the tilting
angle, and n1 and n2 are refractive indexes of surrounding
media and the tilting plate material, respectively.
Figure 2 demonstrates how the distance between the
object and the observer can be evaluated from image shift
by plate tilting. A 14 cm-long pen and a 4.5 cm-long AAA
battery at different distances are seen through a 2.5
cm-thick Plexiglas® plate. Although smaller, the battery
appears the same in size as the pen because it is closer to
the observer, illustrating that size and distance cannot be
read from the planar image. Conventional endoscopic
devices using a single camera setup can only generate
planar images in which operators sometimes cannot
evaluate the right size or distance of the object of interest.
When the plate tilts forward (Figure 2b) and backward
(Figure 2c), the images of the objects shift up and down,
respectively, as a result. What can be used at this point to
evaluate the distance information is the fact that each
object image shows a different shifting amount with
respect to the distances. When the plate tilts, an object
closer to the observer generates a larger image shift than an
object further away due to the difference in distance; the
160
battery closer to the observer shifts more than the pen in the
back. By using this difference in image shift, the distance
and size of each object can be evaluated, once the image
shift at a certain working distance is calibrated.
3. DESIGN AND FABRICATION
Flipping
®
Pyrex disc
Figure 3: Schematic of the flipping disc device. (Left)
Perspective view. (Right) Cut-out view showing the glass
disc in the middle and the ring frame.
Device design
Figure 3 is a schematic drawing of the microfabricated
flipping disc device (not to scale). A 420 µm-thick
transparent disc 1300 µm in diameter is attached to a 40
µm-thick silicon layer with a 1000 µm-diameter opening in
the center to expose the glass, and suspended by two 10 ×
40 × 800 µm torsion bridges. The disc is electrostatically
actuated (i.e., flipped) by two interdigitated sets of silicon
comb drives. While photosensitive polymers (e.g., SU-8)
are widely used to make lenses in optical MEMS field
[8]-[10], Pyrex® is chosen as the transparent disc material
due to its much higher resistance to degradation over time
and discoloration during high temperature fabrication
processes than the photosensitive polymers. To achieve
the required shapes of the transparent disc and the
surrounding structures without using expensive and time
consuming glass machining methods, glass molding [11] is
used at an elevated temperature (> 800ºC), reflowing
Pyrex® into a patterned silicon mold.
Fabrication process
The process flow for the flipping disc device is shown
in Figure 4. A silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer with
heavily doped device layer is used as the starting material
(Figure 4a). The wafer has 100 µm-thick device layer, 1
µm-thick buried oxide, and 500 µm-thick handling layer.
The handling layer of the wafer with polished surface is
patterned and etched down to the oxide layer using deep
reactive ion etching (DRIE) to make a mold for glass filling,
and the exposed oxide is removed (Figure 4b). The
patterned SOI wafer is anodically bonded with a Pyrex®
wafer in vacuum (Figure 4c).
The bonded wafers are thermally annealed at 850°C
(above the glass transition temperature of the Pyrex®) so
that the Pyrex® flows to fill in the Si mold (Figure 4d) [11],
followed by additional anodic bonding to ensure the strong
bond between the filled Pyrex® and the Si device layer.
Because of the vacuum state inside the cavities, the Si mold
is filled by melted Pyrex® using the atmospheric process
pressure in the heating chamber without any external force
applied during the molding process. Unfilled Pyrex® is
then removed by chemical mechanical polishing (CMP)
revealing the Si / Pyrex® surface (Figure 4e). The surface
is additionally polished for smoothness to ensure
161
®
Silicon Oxide Pyrex
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
(h)
(i)
Ring frame Flipping disc Ring frame
Figure 4: Process flow for tilting glass plate device; (a)
SOI wafer as starting material, (b) device layer etch and
exposed oxide removal, (c) anodic bonding of Pyrex®
wafer to patterned SOI wafer, (d) glass molding into the
Si mold followed by 2nd anodic bonding, (e) glass
removal and polishing by CMP, (f) topside Si layer
thinning by DRIE, (g) oxide deposition on top and
patterning, (h) backside Si removal, and (i) comb
patterning by DRIE, releasing the device at the same
time, followed by oxide mask removal
transparency of the glass structures. The device layer is
then thinned down to 40 µm using DRIE (Figure 4f)
followed by oxide masking layer deposition and patterning
on the thinned Si surface (Figure 4g). After the Si mold in
the handling layer is removed (Figure 4h), the device layer
is patterned using DRIE to form comb drive structures and
torsion springs, releasing the device at the same time. The
fabrication is completed by removing the oxide mask on
the device layer (Figure 4i).
Figure 5 shows the fabricated flipping disc device,
showing the 1.3 mm-diameter Pyrex® disc suspended by
two torsion springs. Instead of using additional metal
wires, the patterned silicon device layer of the SOI wafer is
used as electrodes for device operations.
 Flipping disc
Comb drive actuator
Flipping disc
suspended by two
torsion springs
Silicon electrodes
attached to outer
glass ring frame

Time period
Figure 5: Fabricated flipping disc device.
Figure 6: Cross section of the flipping disc (Top), and the
corresponding driving signal (Bottom). A rectangular
wave signal with a duty cycle of 50% at twice the flipping
4. DEVICE TEST AND RESULT disc’s mechanical resonant frequency is applied to both
The suspended Pyrex® disc is driven by two sets of comb drives.
interdigitated comb drives at resonant frequency. The
actuation is similar to [12]-[14] and occurs through
fringe-field electrostatic attraction vertical to the silicon
layer. A rectangular pulse with a duty cycle of 50% at
twice the mechanical resonant frequency of the flipping
disc is used for the tilting. Figure 6 shows the cross section
of the flipping disc and the corresponding driving signal.
Initial excitation for device operation is achieved either by
having asymmetric disc shape for small initial deflection
[13] or by utilizing fabrication induced asymmetry [12].
Figure 7 is the experimental result using the fabricated disc
device with 20 V applied to the comb drives in an open lab
environment (1 atm). Driving signal is swept up and down
by increments of 1 Hz to find the optimum driving
frequencies. The maximum tilting is observed when the
signal frequency is swept down to 994 Hz with 7º of total
tilting, which is equivalent to the disc’s mechanical
resonant frequency of 497 Hz. With the disc thickness of
420 µm, the image shift with 7º tilting is measured to be
16.2 µm by image analysis. Figure 7: Dynamic characterization of the flipping disc
A schematic of the experiment setup for stereo image by frequency sweeping using 20 VAC of rectangular
generation is shown in Figure 8. The fabricated Pyrex® waveform with 50% duty cycle. A total tilting angle of 7°
disc device flips back and forth by electrostatic actuation, has been obtained at 994 Hz in 1 atm air.
and the resulting shift of the images are observed through
the disc by a camera connected to a microscope and
illuminating lights. The camera records image shifts at 300 Microscope
frames per second to obtain overlapped images showing
the image shifting distance. Figure 9 is the computer
screen image of a cross-shaped pattern captured by the Disc flipping
camera. The pattern is 180 µm (wide) × 180 µm (high) in
size, and 3 mm in front of the flipping disc. From the
grabbed image, the shifting distance can be read on the
screen (as in Figure 9) and defined as “D”. The relative
distance D on the screen represents the already measured Shift of image
real image shifting distance of 16.2 µm. That is, the
distance D on the screen can be used as a reference for
objects at 3 mm distance. If the same disc and test setup is
used, various distances of different objects can be
estimated by comparing the relative distance on the screen Figure 8: Schematic of image shift experiment using the
with the distance D. If an observed image shift on the flipping disc.
screen is larger or smaller than this value D, it means that
the object lies closer or farther to the flipping disc than the the object size can be calculated by comparing the size of
reference distance of 3 mm. In this way, size information the objects on the screen with D. For example, the height
can also be obtained without knowing the real size of of the cross pattern on the screen (as in Figure 9) is
viewed objects. Because the distance D on the screen is approximately 11 times D, which means that the height of
already known to be 16.2 µm in real dimensions, the cross pattern is in fact 180 µm.
162

Figure 9: Image shift captured through the flipping disc.
A 180 µm (wide) × 180 µm (high) cross pattern at 3 mm
distance makes a vertical image shift of “D” on the
screen which is equivalent to 16.2 µm of measured image
shift. The size of the cross pattern on the screen is about
11דD”, equivalent to 180 µm of real pattern height.
5. CONCLUSION
Use of stereo images greatly increases the
performance of endoscopic devices by its
three-dimensional measurement capabilities. This paper
presented a stereo imaging method using a single
transparent flipping disc miniaturized and operated by
MEMS technologies. The developed transparent flipping
disc device has confirmed the feasibility of being used in
front of single-lens endoscopic devices to generate such
stereo images for non-contact dimensional measurements
in difficult-to-access areas, minimizing the complexity of
the overall device setup.
6. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors would like to thank Dr. Igor Ternovskiy at
Intelligent Optical Systems (IOS) for his help measuring
and confirming the image shift using his image analysis
software. The work was partially supported by the
National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business
Innovative Research (SBIR) program.
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