Nano-mechanical sensing exploiting frequency shift of a cantilever beam to obtain the mass of an object is well established. This paper is aimed at investigating the possibility of sensing mass as well as rotary inertia of an attached object. The rotary inertia of an object gives additional insight into its shape, which is a key motivation of this work. It is shown that by using two modes it is possible to formulate two coupled nonlinear equations, which it turn can be solved to obtain mass and rotary inertia simultaneously from the frequency shifts of first two vibration modes. Analytical results are validated using high fidelity molecular mechanics simulation.

Date Published: 16 April 2016
PDF: 13 pages
Proc. SPIE 9802, Nanosensors, Biosensors, and Info-Tech Sensors and Systems 2016, 98020E (16 April 2016); doi: 10.1117/12.2222116

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9802:
Nanosensors, Biosensors, and Info-Tech Sensors and Systems 2016
Vijay K. Varadan, Editor(s)