The Distinguished Lecture on “Research on Piezoelectric Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducers (PMUTs) at KU Leuven, Belgium” will take place as follows:
Date: 09 October 2025 (Thursday)
Time: 15:00 – 16:00
Venue: Research Building N21, 3/F, 3004
The speaker is:
Dr. WANG Chen, MNS-ESAT, KU Leuven, Belgium
The Lecture is:
Research on Piezoelectric Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducers (PMUTs) at KU Leuven, Belgium
Abstract:
Piezoelectric Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducers (PMUTs) constitute a pivotal technology that bridges microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and ultrasonic sensing/actuation. This presentation will commence with a foundational overview of PMUT operating principles, covering the selection of piezoelectric materials (e.g., aluminum nitride (AlN), lead zirconate titanate (PZT), and emerging lead-free alternatives), structural designs (including membrane-based, cantilever, and array configurations), and fabrication processes compatible with complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) integration. Subsequently, the presentation will introduce PMUT research initiatives conducted by the MNS Group at KU Leuven, Belgium, which focus on both rigid and flexible PMUT platforms. Several specific projects will be discussed in detail, namely portable ultrasonic devices for medical imaging based on PMUTs and various methods for enhancing PMUT flexibility. It will highlight recent breakthroughs in performance optimization, with key topics including strategies to improve the electromechanical coupling coefficient, extend bandwidth, and realize miniaturization for low-power, high-density array applications. Furthermore, the presentation will explore the transformative roles of PMUTs across diverse fields: medical diagnostics, underwater communication, and consumer electronics.
Biography:
Dr. WANG Chen received his bachelor’s degree from Anhui University in June 2013. In June 2018, he successfully defended his Ph.D. at Zhejiang University, China, and in October 2021, he defended another Ph.D. at the University of Liège, Belgium. The two theses are entirely independent in terms of publications and topics, one in optics and the other in MEMS. His research interests include MEMS design and optimization, MEMS sigma delta modulator closed-loop systems, MEMS pressure sensors, inertial sensors, infrared sensors, and coupled resonators. His research resulted in 40 (14 Optics, 25 MNS) journal paper publications (20 first/last/corresponding author), 51 conference publications (35 first/last/corresponding author), and 8 Chinese patents. He has received several academic awards, including the Research Excellence Award from SPIE in the U.S. (15 out of 3,000) and the Best Presentation Award at the IMEKO 2014 Conference in Japan (2 out of 500), the third place in the “MEMS Design Contest 2018” (organized by Coventor, Cadence, X-FAB), and two best paper finalists at the IEEE MEMS 2022 conference. He serves as a technical program committee member for the 2025 IEEE MEMS Conference, and the 2025 Transducer Conference and the 2022 Eurosensors Conference. He is a guest editor of Sensors journal special issue and reviewer for several journals, including the Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems, IEEE Sensors Journal, Nature Microsystems & Nanoengineering, Nature Communications Engineering and IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics. He has delivered invited lectures at the University of Macau, the University of York (UK), Peking University (China), and various institutes within the Chinese Academy of Sciences (SIMIT, IMECAS), Shanghai Industrial Technology Research Institute. Over the past four years, Chen Wang has secured a total funding budget exceeding 1 million EUR from various funding agencies and industry sources.
