Fully CMOS-SOI compatible low-power directional flow sensor

Abstract

The paper reports an improved low cost directional flow sensor, fully compatible with IC-CMOS SOI (silicon-on-insulator) processes, with fair sensitivity and short response time on a large airflow rate range (from 0 to 8 m/s) at a very low consumption (15 mW). Many different sensing principles can be found in the literature and impose a difficult choice between low power consumption, high airflow rate range, sufficient flow rate sensitivity and compatibility with IC processes. Our sensor challenges most recent realizations by providing attractive trade-offs between these parameters for a large range of applications.