Queensgate Instruments’ latest Digital Piezo Translator (DPT) series of actuators incorporate capacitive sensors in order to deliver precise positioning and rapid settling. These highly advanced actuators can be implemented in a wide variety of applications, including interferometry, semiconductor mask-wafer chuck alignment, beam alignment, cavity tuning, adaptive optics, scanning probe microscopy and a multitude of different metrology tasks.
There are two new series of DPT, the DPT-D with the best in class positioning performance and the more compact DPT-E which is a low voltage replacement for the previous generation DPT-C series. Air and Ultra High Vacuum variants are available as standard. Their Super-Invar construction gives superior thermal properties (with a thermal expansion coefficient of 0.25nm/Kelvin) which enhances position stability. Position resolutions down to 0.09nm (RMS) are offered as each unit delivers <2ms response time, 0.5nm (RMS) repeatability. They are able move loads of up to 60kg across their entire closed loop range, with closed loop ranges from 20um to 110μm.
DPT devices benefit from a built-in calibration function, derived from the Queensgate ID chip arrangement. These ID chips store calibration data on the actuator itself and thereby facilitate plug-and-play operation with the digital controller. Controllers and actuators can be interchanged as required, avoiding the need for recalibration, important when the actuator is incorporated into a mechanism or is inaccessible.
About Queensgate
Based in Cambridge, UK, Queensgate Instruments is at the forefront of nanopositioning technology - serving the market with top quality products that deliver the highest degrees of accuracy and repeatability. The company, which is part of the Elektron Technology Group, has a product portfolio that includes capacitance sensors, nanopositioning actuators and stages. Queensgate was established in 1979. It originating from ground-breaking research that was conducted at Imperial College, London. Today the company’s advanced nanopositioning solutions are used across the globe, in a broad spectrum of industry sectors - such as biotechnology, medicine, astronomy, aerospace, semiconductor manufacture, optics and mass computer storage systems.
Posted by Ditya Pandu
