In this work we use a micromechanical resonator to experimentally study small signal amplification near the onset of Duffing bistability. The device consists of a PdAu beam serving as a micromechanical resonator excited by an adjacent gate electrode. A large pump signal drives the resonator near the onset of bistability, enabling amplification of small signals in a narrow bandwidth. To first order, the amplification is inversely proportional to the frequency difference between the pump and signal. We estimate the gain to be about 15dB for our device.
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0511587,
title = {High intermodulation gain in a micromechanical Duffing resonator},
author = {R. Almog and S. Zaitsev and O. Shtempluck and E. Buks},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0511587},
year = {2009}
}