Patent 7180226 was granted and assigned to NGK Insulators on February, 2007 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
A piezoelectric/electrostrictive device including a ceramic substrate having a pair of mutually opposing thin plate sections, a fixed section for supporting the thin plate sections, and movable sections disposed proximate to ends of the pair of thin plate sections. Each of the movable sections includes a projection spaced a predetermined distance away from tip surfaces of each of the thin plate sections toward the fixed section. The projection includes cermet.