• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.215-220
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• 2012

Miniature ultrasonic and tactile sensors on Si substrate have been proposed, fabricated and characterized to detect objects for a dexterous robot. The ultrasonic sensor consists of piezoelectric PZT thin film on a Pt/Ti/$SiO_2$ and/or Si diaphragm fabricated using a micromachining technique; the ultrasonic sensor detects the piezoelectric voltage as an ultrasonic wave. The sensitivity has been enhanced by improving the device structure, and the resonant frequency in the array sensor has been equalized. Position detection has been carried out by using a sensor array with high sensitivity and uniform resonant frequency. The tactile sensor consists of four or three warped cantilevers which have NiCr or $Si:B^+$ piezoresistive layer for stress detection. Normal and shear stresses can be estimated by calculation using resistance changes of the piezoresitive layers on the cantilevers. Gripping state has been identified by using the tactile sensor which is installed on finger of a robot hand, and friction of objects has been measured by slipping the sensor.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.835-851
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• 2015

This paper presents theoretical and experimental evaluation of the structural health monitoring (SHM) capability of piezoelectric wafer active sensors (PWAS) at elevated temperatures. This is important because the technologies for structural sensing and monitoring need to account for the thermal effect and compensate for it. Permanently installed PWAS transducers have been One of the extensively employed sensor technologies for in-situ continuous SHM. In this paper, the electro-mechanical impedance spectroscopy (EMIS) method has been utilized as a dynamic descriptor of PWAS behavior and as a high frequency standing wave local modal technique. Another SHM technology utilizes PWAS as far-field transient transducers to excite and detect guided waves propagating through the structure. This paper first presents how the EMIS method is used to qualify and quantify circular PWAS resonators in an increasing temperature environment up to 230 deg C. The piezoelectric material degradation with temperature was investigated and trends of variation with temperature were deduced from experimental measurements. These effects were introduced in a wave propagation simulation software called Wave Form Revealer (WFR). The thermal effects on the substrate material were also considered. Thus, the changes in the propagating guided wave signal at various temperatures could be simulated. The paper ends with summary and conclusions followed by suggestions for further work.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.33 no.10
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• pp.1045-1053
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• 2009

Precision stages for 6-DOF positioning, actuated by PZT stacks, which are fed back by gap sensors and guided by flexure hinges, have enlarged their application territory in micro/nano manufacturing and measurement area. The precision stages inherently have such limitations as the nonlinearity between input and output in piezoelectric stacks, feedback signal noise in precision capacitive gap sensors and low material damping in precision kinematic linkages of mechanical flexures. To surmount these limitations, the precision stage is modeled with physics-based variables, which are identified by transient response correspondence, and a gain margin calculation algorithm using the Prandtl-Ishlinskii model and describing function is newly developed to assess system performance more precisely than linear controller design schemes. Based on such analyses, a precision positioning controller is designed. Excellent positioning accuracy with rapid settlement accomplished by the controller is shown in step responses of the closed-loop system.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.03b
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• pp.13-13
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• 2010

Piezoelectric sensors are extensively used to measure force because of their high sensitivity and low cost. however, the development of device with reduced size but with improved sensitivity is highly important. Low-temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) is one of promising materials for this application than a silicon substrate because it has very good electrical and mechanical properties as well as possibility of making various three dimensional (3D) structures. In this work, piezoelectric pressure sensors based on hybrid LTCC technology were presented. The LTCC diaphragms with thickness of $400\;{\mu}m$ were fabricated by laminating 12 green tapes which consist of alumina and glass particle in an organic binder. The piezoelectric sensing layer consists of PZT thin film deposited by RF magnetron sputtering method on between top and bottom Au electrodes. The PZT films deposited on LTCC diaphragms were successfully grown and were analyzed by using X-ray diffraction method (XRD) and field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM).

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2006.04a
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• pp.240-247
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• 2006

Piezoelectric sensor-based health monitoring technique using a two-step support vector machine (SYM) classifier is discussed for damage identification of a railroad track. An active sensing system composed of two PZT patches was investigated in conjunction with both impedance and guided wave propagation methods to detect two kinds of damage of the railroad track (one is a hole damage of 0.5cm in diameter at web section and the other is a transverse cut damage of 7.5cm in length and 0.5cm in depth at head section). Two damage-sensitive features were extracted one by one from each method; a) feature I: root mean square deviations (RMSD) of impedance signatures and b) feature II: wavelet coefficients for $A_0$ mode of guided waves. By defining damage indices from those damage-sensitive features, a two-dimensional damage feature (2-D DF) space was made. In order to minimize a false-positive indication of the current active sensing system, a two-step SYM classifier was applied to the 2-D DF space. As a result, optimal separable hyper-planes were successfully established by the two-step SYM classifier: Damage detection was accomplished by the first step-SYM, and damage classification was also carried out by the second step-SYM. Finally, the applicability of the proposed two-step SYM classifier has been verified by thirty test patterns.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.202-208
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• 2010

This study examined the dependency of crystalline orientation and electric properties of sol-gel PZT film on hydrolysis, a $PbTiO_3$ seed layer and a concentration of sol-gel solution. The PZT thin films were prepared by using 2-Methoxyethanol-based sol-gel method and spin-coating on Pt/Ti/$SiO_2$/Si substrates. The 1-${\mu}m$-thick PZT films were coated and then fired in a furnace by direct insert method. The highly (111) oriented PZT film of pure perovskite structure could be obtained. We could control the degree of orientation by various parameters such as hydrolysis, a $PbTiO_3$ seed layer and a concentration of sol-gel solution. The highest measured remanent polarization, dielectric constant and piezoelectric coefficient are $24.16\;{\mu}C/cm^2$, 2808, and 159 pC/N, respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2013.10a
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• pp.799-804
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• 2013

The sensor/actuator active sensor diagnostics procedure, where the sensors/actuators are confirmed to be functioning properly during operation, is a critical component to successfully complete the structural health monitoring (SHM) process with large numbers of active sensors typically installed in a structure. The basis of this process is to track the changes in the capacitive value of piezoelectric materials, which shows up in measured admittance. Due to the temperature dependent nature of piezoelectric materials, we investigated the effects of temperature variations on sensor diagnostic process. The effect of temperature variations found to be remarkable, modifying the measured capacitive values significantly. In addition we analyzed the effect of bonding agents between a PZT patch and a host structure. This paper summarizes considerations needed to develop such sensor diagnostic processes, experimental procedures and results, and additional issues that can be used as guidelines for future investigations.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.6 no.5_6
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• pp.689-709
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• 2010

In this paper, a low cost, low power but multifunctional wireless sensor node is presented for the impedance-based SHM using piezoelectric sensors. Firstly, a miniaturized impedance measuring chip device is utilized for low cost and low power structural excitation/sensing. Then, structural damage detection/sensor self-diagnosis algorithms are embedded on the on-board microcontroller. This sensor node uses the power harvested from the solar energy to measure and analyze the impedance data. Simultaneously it monitors temperature on the structure near the piezoelectric sensor and battery power consumption. The wireless sensor node is based on the TinyOS platform for operation, and users can take MATLAB$^{(R)}$ interface for the control of the sensor node through serial communication. In order to validate the performance of this multifunctional wireless impedance sensor node, a series of experimental studies have been carried out for detecting loose bolts and crack damages on lab-scale steel structural members as well as on real steel bridge and building structures. It has been found that the proposed sensor nodes can be effectively used for local wireless health monitoring of structural components and for constructing a low-cost and multifunctional SHM system as "place and forget" wireless sensors.

• Composites Research
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.21-27
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• 2007

Low-velocity impact damage in a composite stiffened panel was detected using built-in piezoelectric active sensor arrays. Using these piezoelectric active sensors, various diagnostic signals were generated to propagate Lamb waves through the structure and the responses were picked up to detect changes in the structure's vibration signature due to the damage. Three algorithms - ADI(Active Damage Interrogation), TD RMS (Time Domain Root Mean Square) and STFT (Short Time Fourier Transform) - were examined to express the features of the signal changes as one damage index. From damage detecting tests, two impact induced delaminations were detected and the location was estimated with the algorithms and diagnostic signals.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.22-30
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• 2023

Innovative and advanced technologies, including robots, augmented reality, virtual reality, the Internet of Things, and wearable medical equipment, have largely emerged as a result of the rapid evolution of modern society. For these applications, pressure monitoring is essential and pressure sensors have attracted considerable interest. To improve the sensor performance, several new designs of pressure sensors have been researched based on resistive, capacitive, piezoelectric, optical, and triboelectric types. In particular, optical pressure sensors have been actively studied owing to their advantages, such as robustness to noise and remote sensing capability. Herein, a review of recent research on optical pressure sensors with self-powered sensing, remote sensing, high spatial resolution, and multimodal sensing capabilities is presented from the viewpoints of design, fabrication, and signal processing.