International Journal of Computer Networking, Wireless and Mobile Communications (IJCNWMC) ISSN 2250-1568 Vol. 3, Issue 2, Jun 2013, 29-34 © TJPRC Pvt. Ltd. A REVIEW PAPER ON MEMS CANTILEVER RADIO FREQUENCY SWITCH SHWETA M. SHINGARE & SYED A. NAVEED Department of Electronics, Jawaharlal Nehru Engineering College, Aurangabad, Maharashtra, India ABSTRACT This paper deals with the MEMS (Micro-Electro-Mechanical-System) Cantilever RF (Radio Frequency) switch. These switches exhibit low insertion loss and better isolation at sufficiently high frequencies. The dominance of Cantilever RF-Switch also explains the spring constant for cantilever, pull-in voltage, hold-down voltage, resonant frequency for cantilever to be used as resonators or any high frequency applications. The dominance of RF- Switch also explains with the size, power, isolation, insertion loss. This paper explains graphically how Pull-in voltage affects on the tip deflection of the switch and switching time. KEYWORDS: RF-MEMS, RF Switch, PIN Diodes, Pull-In Voltage, Isolation, Insertion Loss INTRODUCTION The MEMS (Micro-electro-mechanical-system) RF (Radio frequency) Switches are most important because of their Performance characteristic. MEMS RF switches offer distinct advantages over their solid-state counterparts, including characteristics such as low power, low insertion loss, and high isolation. MEMS gives the designer the flexibility with micrometer size. MEMS switches are dominating over existing semiconductor devices such as PIN Diodes, Field-effect-transistors because of their small size, less power consumption, low insertion loss and high OFF-state isolation. One more advantage of RF MEMS switch is fabrication process is compatible with CMOS technology so these switches can easily interfaced with rest of the circuitry. Because of electromechanical isolation, RF circuit doesn’t leak or couple significantly to the actuation circuit. And electromechanical coupling is done through electro statically through air less power required because power consumes only when actuation occurs. Based on MEMS actuation, MEMS switches can be classified by following three characteristics;  RF circuit configuration;  Mechanical structure;  Form of contact. RF MEMS Switches For wireless communication Radio frequency (RF) signals are used, the range of RF signals is huge that is from 9 KHz to 300 MHz, As RF signals exhibits electromagnetic field for this purpose micromachined devices such as filters, oscillators and switches required. For wireless communication applications RF switches are designed at high frequency (1MHz to 60 GHz).RF MEMS circuits leaves huge impact on communication applications such as handset (mobile phones) because of their small in size, low power consumption, less insertion loss and high isolation. With this there are some disadvantages of MEMS switches such as low switching time and high actuation voltage. Commonly series or parallel connected circuit configurations are used. The most used RF MEMS mechanical structures are the cantilever beam and the