Tutorial Session 4C - Piezoelectric Sensors as Electronic/electrical Devices

Abstract

This tutorial will cover devices based on piezoelectric crystals and used for materials characterization and sensor applications. Various acoustic wave devices used for physical and bio-chemical sensing applications will be presented and described. The course will then focus on two types of piezoelectric sensors that have reached some level of maturity – available as commercial products or under development. They are the thickness shear mode (TSM) resonators and surface acoustic wave (SAW) devices (both Rayleigh SAW and shear horizontal-SAW) used for sensing in gas and/or liquid phase. Devices with selective absorptive coatings will be described. The electronic/electrical characteristics of the sensor devices will be given. Sensor device principles, design parameters, operating characteristics, and key sensing parameters will be covered. Various measurement schemes used with the piezoelectric sensors will be described.