| The motivation for developing a precision translation stage, presented in this dissertation, is to help facilitate the transition from nanoscience to productive nanotechnology. The positioning stage is to provide the ability to "pick and place" at nanometer levels and compare system performance with other comparable designs at international locations such as, National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in the UK, Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Germany, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the USA, and our own sub-atomic measuring machine (SAMM) at UNC Charlotte. The positioning stage was designed to have an areal travel range of 50 mm x 50 mm, while obtaining a positioning accuracy of better than 10 nm traceable to the national standards. Further specifications were to achieve a translation speed of 5 mm·s-1 and operate the positioning stage in a vacuum environment below 10-3 torr. Two separate positioning stages are used: a two degree-of-freedom (DOF) long-range stage and a six DOF short-range stage. The short-range stage is mounted to the top, and is responsible for correcting the position errors, of the long-range stage. Whereas, the long-range stage provides translations in two axes of up to 50 mm and maintains the short-range stage in its mid-displacement range. |
