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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 1

Abstract - We present a MEMS based sensor for the thermal
detection of changes of gas mixtures such as the CO
2

concentration in air which is of interest in air conditioning
climate control within buildings. Key properties of the system are
low power consumption (less than ) and high long term
stability through the absence of moving or consumptive
components.
The used sensor chip has three silicon-micro-wires
(thermistors) surrounded by the gas mixture to be analyzed. A
centered wire (heater) is supplied with sinusoidal heating power.
This induces a thermal response via the surrounding gas to
measurement wires (detectors) located in different distances from
the heater. The phase shift between heating power and induced
thermal responses at the detectors is analyzed and depends on the
thermal properties of the gas. After calibration the sensor is able
to quantify the concentration of an individual component within
a mixture of different but known gas components. This is
demonstrated by measuring the CO
2
concentration in N
2
/CO
2

mixtures with a resolution of at constant pressure and
temperature.

I ndex TermsMEMS, thermal gas sensor, CO
2
sensor

I. INTRODUCTION
AS SENSING is a strongly growing market for many fields
of applications. Mostly the selective measurement of

Manuscript received December 07, 2012; Resubmitted January 13, 2013;
Revision February 10, 2013.
This work was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and
Technology via grant No. 16046 N of the German Federation of Industrial
Research Associations (AiF).
K. Kliche was with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik
(HSG-IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany. (e-mail:
klichekurt@googlemail.de)
G. Kattinger is with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik
(HSG-IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany. (gerhard.kattinger@hsg-
imit.de)
S. Billat is with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik (HSG-
IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany. (corresponding author to provide
phone: +49 7721 943-242; sophie.billat@hsg-imit.de)
L. Shen was with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik (HSG-
IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany.
S. Messner was with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik
(HSG-IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany.
R. Zengerle is with the Institut fr Mikro- und Informationstechnik (HSG-
IMIT), Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany and the Department of
Microsystems Engineering - IMTEK of the University of Freiburg, Germany
(roland.zengerle@hsg-imit.de)

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However, permission to use this material for any other purposes must be
obtained from the IEEE by sending a request to pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
single components inside a gas mixture is of interest. There
are many well-established gas sensor principles [1-9] targeting
this application. In some cases non-selective methods
detecting properties of the overall mixture can give enough
information to determine the amount of a single component. In
cases where the varying component is known and the thermal
properties (thermal conductivity , thermal diffusivity ,
specific heat capacity

and density ) of the different

elements of the gas mixtures differ sufficiently, the thermal
measurement principle can be a low power and low cost
alternative for existing gas sensor principles.
Sensors to determine gas concentrations based on the
measurement of the thermal conductivity are well-established
on the market [10-16]. But, as TABLE I shows, thermal
conductivity is only one thermal property that enables to
differentiate gases. Other thermal properties such as specific
heat capacity, thermal diffusivity or density could be used for
improving the analysis of gases. For example the thermal
conductivity of CO
2
differs about compared to air but in
the thermal diffusivity the difference is . Thus, using a
transducing mechanism based on additional properties than the
thermal conductivity alone can offer the opportunity to
improve the thermal distinction of gas mixtures.

TABLE I
THERMAL PROPERTIES OF SOME GASES
AT PRESSURE P=1 BAR AND TEMPERATURE T=25 C

Thermal gas properties often differ more in the specific heat capacity or the
thermal diffusivity than in the thermal conductivity. Exemplarily the
percentage differences of the gas properties relative to air are given.


Thermal
conductivity

(mW m
-1
K
-1
)
Specific heat
capacity
c
p

(kJ kg
-1
K
-1
)
Thermal
diffusivity
a
(mm
2
s
-1
)
Density


(kg m
-3
)
Air 26.2
diff.
(%)
1.01
diff.
(%)
22.3
diff.
(%)
1.17
diff.
(%)
N
2
25.9 1.2 1.04 3.0 22.0 1.4 1.13 3,4
CO
2
16.6 37 0.85 16 11.0 51 1.78 52
O
2
26.4 0.7 0.92 8.9 21.9 1.8 1.29 10
H
2
181 591 14.3 1316 154
#)
591 0.08
*)
93
He 154 488 5.19 414 185
#)
730 0.16
*)
86
CH
4
34.0 30 2.22 120 23.6
#)
5.8 0.65
*)
44
Standard Source: VDI-Wrmeatlas [17]
*): calculated out of individual gas constants

given in [18] (

)
#): calculated out of the other thermal properties (

)


Sensor for thermal gas analysis based on
micromachined silicon-micro-wires
K. Kliche, G. Kattinger, S. Billat, L. Shen, S. Messner and R. Zengerle
G
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 2
There are several publications regarding the determination
of thermal properties. In [14;19;20] sinusoidal heated thin
metal foils are used to measure thermal conductivity, thermal
diffusivity and specific heat capacity of solids and fluids.
Other works show the determination of the thermal
conductivity and the thermal diffusivity with sinusoidal heated
platinum wires [12;21;22]. One proposed method for the
determination of thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity
is to use wires and the 3 method for signal analysis [23;24].
Some groups develop MEMS based devices to determine
thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity of liquids and
gases [22;25;26]. Ernst proposed to determine the specific heat
capacity of gases with MEMS devices [27]. A prominent
application for MEMS based thermal gas analysis is to
combine flow sensing with fluid characterization [28-32].
In a pre-study we already reported about basic examinations
regarding the determination of thermal properties of gases [33]
applying sensor chips having thermal elements on thin silicon
nitride membranes [34;35]. Actually most MEMS solutions to
measure thermal properties of liquids or gases apply similar
structures on thin membranes. But, as mentioned by J.
Kuntner, et. al. in [36], when using membrane based
architectures the spurious heat flow in the membrane is not
negligible and a mixture of membrane properties and media
properties is measured. Micro bridges surrounded by the gas
to be analyzed are suggested to be a better solution for thermal
gas analysis.
Here, we present a microchip employing silicon-micro-
wires surrounded by the gas to be analyzed as the basic
component of a self-sufficient electronic system to distinguish
gas mixtures. The system can be calibrated to determine the
concentration of a varying component within a mixture with
other gas components. Its main advantages are:
- Low power consumption (less than ) due to the
use of simple analog electronic components and a low
power microcontroller.
- Capability for overall miniaturization of sensor system.
- Good long term stability through the absence of
moving or consumptive components.
II. SENSOR CHIP
The sensor chip contains silicon-micro-wires surrounded by
the gas to be analyzed (Fig. 1). It is fabricated by an
established process using a SOI wafer as presented by S. Billat
et. al. [35].

Fig. 1: MEMS sensor chip: Three silicon-micro-wires are bridging a cavity a
centered heater and two detectors in different distances.

The silicon chip ( ) contains
three silicon-micro-wires bridging a cavity ( ). A
centered wire (width ; height ) with a low
electrical resistance ( ) is used as joule heater. Two wires
( ) with higher resistances ( ) are used as
temperature detectors (thermistors) to determine changes of
the gas temperature in different distances ( ; )
from the heating wire. The layout of the microchip is based on
two basic principles.
1) Spatial separation of heater and detector through the
gas to be analyzed
To get sure that differences of the detector signal depend on
changing thermal gas properties only, the heat flux responsible
to warm up the detector must flow directly through the gas.
This is realized by spatial separation of the heating wire from
the detecting wires through the gas to be analyzed.

2) Analyzing heating response in different distances
The overall heat transfer process from the heater to one
detector can be divided into three parts: heat transition from
the heater into the gas, heat transfer through the gas and heat
transition from the gas into the detector. By measuring in two
different distances the heat transfer conditions remain the
same. In the difference between the two detector signals the
two constant heat transition effects are canceled out. Equal
temperature changes with the same size in both detecting
wires (for instance caused by a measurement current) are
canceled out, also. The difference between the detector signals
is influenced only by the heat transfer through the gas. Thus, it
only depends on the thermal properties of the gas.

1
0
0
0

m
cross section (CAD)
6.5 mm
2
.
5

m
m
detector 2
heater
200m
300m
detector 1
400 m
8 m
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 3
III. MEASUREMENT PRINCIPLE AND SETUP
Fig. 2 illustrates the main heat fluxes which occur during
thermal measurements with the chip.

Fig. 2: Cross sectional view through the microchip including the main heat
fluxes which occur during thermal measurements.

Heating power is dissipated in the heating wire. It causes
four heat fluxes to ambient temperature:

2 1 D D gas h
Q Q Q Q P

+ + + = (1)

A major fraction of the heating power flows through the
heating wire itself into the bulk material of the chip (heat flux

). The rest of the heat flow is transferred into the gas (heat
flux

). Only a small fraction of the heating power reaches

the detecting wires and can be utilized for the analysis of the
gas content (

and

).
Thermography investigations with an IR camera [37]
showed that even at the high heating power of the
bulk temperature remains constant at ambient temperature.
Thus, as we dont see a temperature gradient in the bulk
material, we dont expect conductive heat flux from the
heating wire to the detecting wires via the bulk material
influencing the measurements. Additionally we are using
lower heating power (less than ) compared to those
investigations.
Applying sinusoidal heating power to the heating wire
induces a sinusoidal temperature profile in the detectors. Due
to the transient spreading of the temperature field into the gas
there exists a phase shift between heater signal and detector
signals. Additionally, due to the heat dissipation into the gas
the medium itself heats up over time. Hence, amplitude, offset
and phase shifts of the signal at the detecting wires strongly
depend on the thermal properties of the gas. Figure 3 shows
raw data of applied heating power (frequency ;
offset ; amplitude ) and resulting signals of
detector 1 for measurements in N
2
and CO
2
.
In the presented sensor concept the phase shift between
heating power and the individual detectors as well as the phase
difference between detector 1 and 2 are evaluated. The method
of phase shift analysis is chosen because it can be realized
with simple and low power consuming electronic devices as
explained below. Additionally using the phase shift analysis
the absolute temperature information of the detecting wires is
not needed for the thermal gas analysis.


Fig. 3: Raw data of a measurement with sinusoidal heating power (frequency
; offset

; amplitude

). The behavior of the

signal of detector 1 varies in offset, amplitude and phasing by measurement in
different gases (CO2, N2)

One advantage of the sensor chip is that it can easily be
mounted into a simple housing. No complicated adjustment of
the sensor chip is needed. The setup shown in Fig. 4 is used
for the measurements. The sensor chip is glued onto a base
plate out of brass. It is electrically connected by wire bonding
to a PCB which is used as adapter for electronic connection. A
cover is mounted on the sensor plate. It contains fluidic
connectors for gas inlet and outlet as well as to connect a
barometric pressure sensor (EPCOS ASB 1200 offering a
measurement range from to ). A
PT1000 element (IST P1K0.232.6W.B.020) is used to
measure the gas temperature inside the measurement chamber.
The long neck of the chip is used to separate the active
elements of the microchip inside the measurement chamber
and the electronic connection (wire bonds) outside with a
simple O-ring sealing. Thus, no wires have to be lead inside
the chamber to connect the chip.

Fig. 4: Cross sectional view of the measurement setup. Active elements of the
sensor chip inside the measurement chamber and electrical connection
(outside) can easily be separated by an O-ring sealing.

P
gas
Q

2
d
1
d
d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

2
1
D
Q

2
D
Q

h
Q

h
e
a
t
e
r
B
u
l
k
T
amb
T
amb
20 25 30 35 40
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
10
12
14
16

p = 1,0 bar | T = 25 C | f = 120 Hz | PO= 3 mW | PA= 2 mW
heating
power
CO
2
h
e
a
t
i
n
g

p
o
w
e
r

(
m
W
)


time (ms)
N
2
s
i
g
n
a
l

d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

1

(
m
V
)

C
O
2




N
2
Dj
CO2
Dj
N2
o-ring
chip
PT1000
gas inlet
connector
pressure sensor
PCB
measurement
chamber
base plate
electrical
connections
sensor
elements
cover
1 mm
10 mm
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 4
For calibration, the measurement setup is attached to a
measurement station where a stream of a preset gas mixture
out of air, N
2
and CO
2
can be created using Bronkhorst mass
flow controllers. The gas mixture is lead into the measurement
chamber with defined pressure using a Hoerbiger pressure
controller. The CO
2
-concentration of the mixture is detected
with an infrared reference sensor (madur madIR-D01). By
mounting the setup onto a Peltier element which can be used
to heat or cool it, its temperature can be controlled using the
integrated PT1000 as reference.
IV. ELECTRONICS
A microcontroller- steered electronics has been developed
implementing all parts necessary to drive the sensor chip:
- Control a sinusoidal heating power
- Measure and amplify the detector signals
- Convert the sinusoidal signals to square waves
- Record time information of the square waves
- Detect signals of pressure and temperature sensors
- Communication with a PC

A. Heating power control
The measurement principle requires a sinusoidal temporal
temperature profile of the heating wire. The average
temperature of the heating wire is proportional to the applied
heating power which is generated by an analog electronic
controller as shown in Fig. 5.


Fig. 5: Block diagram showing the principle of the analog electronic unit to
control the heating power.

The transient heating power is monitored using the high-
side power monitor Maxim MAX4210E [38]. It measures
the transient heating current

at a shunt resistance

and
the transient voltage

across the heating wire. The heating

current is limited by the resistance

. The transient heating

power equals the product of

and

. This is calculated by
the power monitor. It generates an output voltage

proportional to the heating power. This voltage level is
amplified by factor to the voltage

.
To ensure sinusoidal heating power we applied a
proportional controller which compares the transient heating
power (signal

) with a reference (signal

) from a
lookup-table to result in the new regulating variable

as
follows:

) ( ) (
Pr
k U U g t U
Pms ef reg
= (2)

The regulating variable

is applied to a transistor
(Philips BC847 [39]) to control the heating current

which
depends linearly on the base-emitter voltage (

in the
range between and at . The factors k
and g in Fig. 5 are just scaling factors.

B. Measuring of the detector signals
The detectors (thermistors) made of silicon show a positive
temperature coefficient. Thus their resistances increase with
the temperature. The resistances are determined with simple
bridge circuits as schematically shown in Fig. 6.
Potentiometers are used to adjust the measurement bridge. The
bridge voltage

is amplified by factor to the voltage

.


Fig. 6: Schematics of the bridge circuit used to get a signal corresponding to
the detector resistance and thus to the detector temperature.

C. Conversion of the sinusoidal signals
Both, heating power and detector signals have sinusoidal
characteristics (see section III) and are represented as voltage
levels. For measurements in N
2
the corresponding
characteristics is shown in Fig. 7.


Fig. 7: Raw signals (measurements in N2) for a frequency of 120 Hz taken
with an oscilloscope show sinusoidal characteristics for the signals over time.
Left axis: heater signal

proportional to heating power. Left axis:

detector signals

.and

.

Instr.
ampl.
(INA122)
heater Controller
MSP430
(Lookup-Table)
power monitor
(MAX4210E)
-
g x
U
h
U
Pms
I
h
+Vcc
R
S
h
u
n
t
R
l
i
m
x
U
reg
U
Ppc
U
Pref
I
h
k
U
Pref
x
GND
Instr. ampl.
(INA126UA)
U
B
GND
d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

7
5
0
0
1
2
k
1
2
k
.
.
.
5
0
0
VRef
x
g
U
D

7
5
0
0
-10 -5 0 5 10
0,0
0,5
1,0
1,5
2,0
2,5
3,0
-0,37
-0,36
-0,35
-0,34
-0,33
-0,32
-0,31
d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

s
i
g
n
a
l
s

(
V
)
h
e
a
t
e
r

s
i
g
n
a
l

(
V
)
time (ms)

heater
detector 2
detector 1
Copyright (c) 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 5
The quantities to be determined are the phase shifts between
heater and detector signals as well as the phase difference
between both detectors. To get this information the sinusoidal
signals are transformed into square waves with conserved
phase information, which later facilitates the measurement of
the phase differences by just detecting the time information of
the rising edges. For identifying the time information an ultra-
low-power microcontroller (MSP430) is used. The
transformation is done in four steps with simple analog
electronic circuits as exemplarily shown in Fig. 8 for the
signal of detector 1.

1) Filtering and amplification
To reduce noise, a low pass filter is used. Due to the amplifier
used an inverted output signal is generated.

2) Derivation
As can be seen from the raw data in Fig. 7, the detector
signals have an offset. It depends on the temperature of the gas
to be analyzed and the adjustment of the used bridge circuits
to determine the detector signals. To simplify the extraction of
the phase information the offset is cut off by an analog
electronic derivation. This can be done because the offset does
not affect phase information. In principal the derivation of a
sinusoidal function

with amplitude A and offset leads to

a cosine function

without offset:

) cos( ) ( '
) sin( ) (
1
1
t A t U
offset t A t U
= =
=
=
+ =
(3)

Due to the used electronic circuit in our case the signal is
additionally inverted and scaled in amplitude. Furthermore the
signal gets an additional constant phase shift of . Due
to the fact that the same transformation is done with all
sinusoidal signals the relative phase differences are not
affected. This way the sinusoidal

with amplitude

,
without offset is generated from signal

as follows:

) cos( ) (
) sin( ) (
2 2
1
= =
=
=
+ =
t A t U
offset t A t U
(4)

3) Square wave transformation
Using a phase comparator the positive parts of the
sinusoidal signals are transformed into voltage level 1 and
the negative parts into voltage level 0. Again, the relative
phase differences of all signals are not affected by this
transformation. The phase differences now can be calculated
from the points of time of the rising edges and the frequency
of the signals.


Fig. 8: Raw data of the electronic signals with a frequency of 120 Hz taken
with an oscilloscope illustrate the main steps used to electronically convert the
sinusoidal raw signals into square wave signals with conserved phase
information.

4) Recording the time information
To match the voltage of required from the
microcontroller the square wave signals of heating power,
detector 1 and detector 2 are amplified (Fig. 9). Three digital
input ports of the microcontroller are used to trigger internal
timers and store the actual time points of the rising edges of
the three signals. Using the DMA (Direct Memory Access)
mode of the microcontroller the resolution in time is defined
by its clock frequency of which corresponds to
.

Fig. 9: Transformed signals for heating power and both detectors. The phase
shifts between the signals can be extracted from the time delays of the rising
edges of the square wave signals. Those phase shifts correspond with the
phase shifts of the original sinusoidal signals.

GND
filter and
amplify
GND
derivate
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15
0,0
0,2
0,4
0,6
0,8
1,0
s
q
u
a
r
e

(
V
)
time (ms)
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15
-200
-100
0
100
200
d
e
r
i
v
a
t
e
d

(
m
V
)
time (ms)
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15
-2,0
-1,8
-1,6
-1,4
f
i
l
t
e
r
e
d

(
V
)
time (ms)
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15
800
850
900
d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

1

(
m
V
)
time (ms)
GND
GND
comparator
-10 -5 0 5 10
0
1
2
3
4
h
e
a
t
e
r
s
i
g
n
a
l
s

(
V
)
time (ms)
detector 2
detector 1
Copyright (c) 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 6
D. Functional structure of the overall system
Fig. 10 summarizes the functional structure of the overall
sensor. The electronics is connected to a PC via USB. The PC-
Software is used to set the measurement parameters
(frequency, heating power, number of periods to be measured)
and visualization of the measurement results.
When new settings are received by the microcontroller a
new sequence is started. First, a lookup table listing voltage
values for 360 equidistant time steps of one sinus period is
generated. A timer is set up to give an interrupt for every of
the 360 time steps. The timer runs continuously. After every
interrupt one value out of the lookup table is taken and
forwarded to the digital/analog (D/A) converter of the
microcontroller. The frequency of the signal is set by
adjusting the step size of the timer. As described above the
D/A voltage

is used to generate the power signal for the

heater of the thermal sensor chip.
The sinusoidal signals of heating power, detector 1 and
detector 2 are collected and converted into square waves. The
points of time of the rising edges are stored as described
above. After acquisition of points in time for periods
(typically ), the mean values for the three
possible differences (heater detector 1 | heater detector 2
| detector 1 detector 2) are calculated and sent to the PC.
Additionally, pressure and temperature taken with external
sensors are stored using an A/D port of the microcontroller
and sent to the PC.
As shown in the next section, in the PC the concentration of
one changing component in a gas mixture can be calculated
from the phase shifts of the three signals after calibration.
Finally the results are visualized with the PC.

V. CHARACTERIZATION AND CALIBRATION
To calibrate the sensor, the measurement setup shown in
Fig. 4 is filled with mixtures of dry gases at defined pressure
and temperature.
A. Heating power
The first step to characterize the sensor is to define
appropriate values for offset and amplitude of the sinusoidal
power signal to drive the heating wire. On the one hand the
heating power should be as low as possible in order to
minimize temperature changes to the gas to be analyzed. On
the other hand it has to be high enough to get measureable
temperatures changes at the detecting wires. The operating
parameters for offset

and amplitude

of the heating power where empirically determined.

B. Frequency characteristics
To determine the optimal frequency, measurements in pure
N
2
and CO
2
where done at constant absolute pressure (
) and temperature ( ). For the results
shown in Fig. 11 the time information of at least 60 periods
are measured and stored in the microcontroller before sending
the mean value of the phase shift to the PC. In the PC again at
least 60 measurements are averaged. Thus one data point in
the graphs represents the average of at least 3600 periods.

Fig. 10: Illustration of structure and functionality of the overall sensor system
sensors
USB
data
prepa-
ration
C
PC
send
frequency f; offset P
O;
amplitude P
A
number of measurements n
create lookup
table
360 Points
Heat power
controller
D/A
converter
convert to
Square wave
store times
of rising edges
time points
calculate
mean values
A/D
converter
pressure
sensor
temperature
sensor
collect
signal
collect
signal
Visualize
Signals
calculate
pressure and temperature
dependency;
calibrated results
send
time shifts,
temperature, pressure
lookup table
yes
n
values?
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 7


Fig. 11: Frequency characteristics of the phase shifts from heater to detector 1
and heater to detector 2 (left axis) as well as the phase difference from
detector 1 to detector 2 (right axis) for measurements in CO2

Measurements in pure CO
2
(Fig. 11) show that the phase
shift between heater and detector 2 increases with the
frequency up to a critical frequency of about . The
phase difference between detector 1 and 2 increases with
frequency and reaches a maximum already at a critical
frequency of about . As depicted in Fig. 12 the
amplitude of the detector oscillation in general decreases with
the frequency. It can be extracted from Fig. 12 that the critical
frequency for the phase difference between detector 1 and 2 in
Fig. 11 corresponds to the frequency when the amplitude of
the detector signal is reduced to a critical value of .
Below this amplitude the resistance changes of the sensing
wires are too low to be correctly detected with the used
electronics. As a consequence we limited heating frequencies
in further experiments with CO
2
to this critical frequency.

The frequency characteristics in N
2
(not shown here) show a
similar behavior as this in CO
2
. But due to the larger heat
conduction of N
2
the amplitude of the temperature oscillation
is larger and a higher critical frequency of is reached.

Fig. 12: Frequency characteristics of the signal amplitude at detector 2 in N2
and CO2. We limited all measurements of phase differences to frequencies
below the critical frequencies which are defined by having a signal amplitude
above 0.1 mV.

Another important factor to indicate an optimal frequency is
the difference between measurements in N
2
and CO
2
. The
more the two gases differ in the results, the better they can be
distinguished. The frequency depending phase differences of
detector 1 and detector 2 in pure N
2
and CO
2
are shown in Fig.
13. Within the range of the results for the phase
differences in N
2
and CO
2
rises linearly. The coefficients of
determination for the linear fits shown in Fig. 13 are

for N
2
and

for CO
2
. The slopes are
for N
2
and for CO
2
. In order to
minimize the response time of the sensor system, the highest
possible frequency ( ) was choosen for the
measurements.


Fig. 13: Frequency characteristics of the phase difference between detector 1
and detector 2 in pure N2 and CO2
C. Mixture distinction
Fig. 14 presents calibration data for CO
2
in
N
2
/CO
2
mixtures. As reference an infrared CO
2
sensor
(madur MadIR-D01) is used. The measurements are done at
consant pressure ( ) and temperature (
). To get the maximum possible accuracy the
frequency of the sinusoidal heating power is set to the critical
frequency . One data point in the graph is the
calculated mean value of measurements taken within 1 minute.
At the frequency of within 1 minute the single values
of 12,000 sinus periods are averaged.


Fig. 14: Calibration data of 010 % CO2 in N2/CO2 mixtures at f=200 Hz,
T=25.0 C and p=1.00 bar. One data point represents the mean value of
12,000 periods taken within 1 minute. Left axis: Phase shifts from heater to
detector 1 and 2. Right axis: Phase difference between detector 1 and detector
2.

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
0
25
50
75
100
difference
(detector 1 2)
medium: CO
2
p = 1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 10..500 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
heater detector 1
heater detector 2

p
h
a
s
e

s
h
i
f
t

(

)
frequency (Hz)
linear fit
p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
f
crit,CO2
= 200 Hz
p = 1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 10..500 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
N
2
CO
2

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

d
e
t
e
c
o
r

2

(
m
V
)
frequency (Hz)
f
crit,N2
= 280 Hz
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
p = 1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 10..350 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
N
2
CO
2
linear fits

p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

1

d
e
t
e
c
t
o
r

2
frequency (Hz)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
170
180
190
200
210
220
32,0
32,4
32,8
33,2
33,6
34,0
difference
(detector 1 2)
p = 1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 200 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
heater detector 1
heater detector 2

p
h
a
s
e

s
h
i
f
t

(

)
CO
2
(%)
p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
Copyright (c) 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 8
The phase shifts from heater to detector 1 and detector 2 as
well as the phase difference between detector 1 and detector 2
rises linearly with the CO
2
concentration. Here, the phase
difference is used for the following investigations. However,
also the other two curves in principal could be used for
calibration.
To define the possible resolution of the sensor and the lower
limit of detection measurements for lower CO
2
concentrations
from CO
2
in N
2
were performed (Fig. 15).


Fig. 15: Calibration data of 02 % CO2 in N2/CO2 mixtures at f=200 Hz,
T=25.0 C and p=1.00 bar. One data point represents the mean value of
12,000 periods taken within 1 minute. Left axis: Phase difference between
detector 1 and 2. Right axis: Deviation between measured mean values and
linear fit.

The coefficient of determination of the linear fit shown in
Fig. 15 is

. The sensitivity of the sensor in the low

range of CO
2
concentrations is the slope of the linar fit:

. The standard deviation of the measured

values from the linear fit is . The standard
deviation containing of a normal distribution is
The resolution of the sensor extracted from
the measurements in figure 15 is

.
Due to the uncertainty of the used flow controllers for small
gas fluxes there is no data point of CO
2
and between
CO
2
and CO
2
(taken with the IR reference
sensor.) Therefore we declared the lower limit of detection to
be CO
2
even when the resolution determined is below
that value.

D. Pressure and temperature dependency
Due to the high dependency to ambient pressure and
temperature it is necessary to precisely calibrate the sensor for
variations of those parameters to reach the maximal possible
resolution. Fig. 16 shows the pressure dependency of the
phase differences between detector 1 and detector 2 in pure N
2

and CO
2
at constant temperature ( ).


Fig. 16: Pressure dependency of the phase difference between detector 1 and
detector 2 in pure N2 and pure CO2 at T = 25 C

In the measured range between the phase
differences depend linearly on the absolute pressure. The
coefficients of determination of the linear fits shown in Fig. 16
are

for N
2
and

for CO
2
. The linear fit
for CO
2
is worse than that for N
2
but still acceptable to assume
linear behavior. The sensitivity (slope of the fit) of the phase
difference in respect to the pressure is for N
2
and
for CO
2
. The gap between both increases with
. Assuming the sensitivity of

for
detecting the concentration of CO
2
in N
2
this corresponds to an
cross-sensitivity to pressure changes of

for a constant temperature of . So a pressure change of
results in the same effect compared to a change in
CO
2
concentration of .

Fig. 17 shows the temperature dependency for
measurements in pure N
2
and CO
2
at constant pressure
( ) for a temperature range between .


Fig. 17: Temperature dependency of the phase difference between detector 1
and detector 2 in pure N2 and pure CO2 at p = 1.00 bar

The temperature dependency shows different behavior in N
2

and CO
2
. The coefficients of determination of the linear fits
shown in Fig. 17 are

for N
2
and

for
CO
2
. For the characteristics in N
2
the coefficient is very low
because the values are nearly constant in the shown
temperature range. The phase difference in N
2
slightly rises by
. In CO
2
it decreases by . Thus the gap
0,0 0,2 0,4 0,6 0,8 1,0 1,2 1,4 1,6 1,8 2,0 2,2
32,2
32,3
32,4
32,5
32,6
d
e
v
i
a
t
i
o
n

(

)
p = 1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 200 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW

p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
CO
2
(%)
difference (detector 1 2)
linear fit
-0,10
-0,05
0,00
0,05
0,10
deviation

0.95 1.00 1.05 1.10
30
35
40
45
50
55
p = 0.95...1.1 bar | T = 25 C | f = 200 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
N
2
CO
2
linear fits

p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
pressure (bar)
19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28
30
35
40
45
50
55
60
p = 1 bar | T = 19...28 C | f = 200 Hz | PO = 3 mW | PA = 2 mW
N
2
CO
2
linear fits

p
h
a
s
e

d
i
f
f
e
r
e
n
c
e

(

)
temperature (C)
Copyright (c) 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 9
between both decreases with . Assuming the
sensitivity of

for detecting CO
2
in N
2
the
cross-sensitivity to temperature changes is

at
constant pressure of .
It should be mentioned here again, that the cross
sensitivities to pressure and temperature have been determined
for the working point of and . If the sensor is
operated at different pressure and temperature levels those
cross sensitivities would have to be determined again.

VI. CONCLUSIONS AND OUTLOOK
This paper presents a sensor for thermal gas analysis that
can be used to distinguish mixtures of gases of known
components. In the current state the sensor works self-
sufficient and is powered via an USB interface connected to a
PC. Simple analog electronic components are utilized to
generate sinusoidal heating power and to determine the phase
shifts between two detector signals in two different distances
from the heater ( and ). In this first stage of
development by using mean values of 12,000 periods taken
within 1 minute the presented sensor can already be calibrated
to measure CO
2
concentrations in a mixture of dry CO
2
and N
2

gas with a lower limit of detection of and a resolution of
. Due to the cross sensitivity of the sensor to pressure
and temperature this requires to measure the pressure and the
temperature with a resolution significantly better than
and respectively. This is definitely a great challenge
in a given application, but not out of reach.
For the future there are several possibilities to improve the
sensor. The electronic components can be optimized to
decrease noise of the raw signals to improve the lower limit of
detection. The analysis of the behavior regarding the used
electronic components and electromagnetic disturbances can
lead to further improvements. A first step towards this could
be to miniaturize the electronics now arranged on a standard
sized PCB (

). Also the cross sensitivity to

absolute pressure and temperature should be implemented in
data processing.
Other ways to determine the phasing of the detector signals
can be examined. In the presented system only the phase shifts
are evaluated. For example, by including offset and amplitude
of the resulting detector signals in data processing, further data
could be obtained giving information about the gas properties.
Furthermore the implementation of other types of heating
power signals (e.g. square waves) and according ways of
analysis (e.g. maximum, minimum and slope of the received
detector signal) could lead to more information about the gas.
At this stage the presented chip design should be regarded
as a proof-of-principle of a new method based on analyzing
the thermal response of a gas in different distances from a
heater to characterize its properties. Further research regarding
optimum geometry such as size and shape of the micro-wires
of the detector and the used materials will probably lead to
improvements of the sensor. For example by increasing the
distance between the detecting wires the sensor resolution
could possibly be increased. To optimize the chip layout many
influences have to be considered in future research. For
example it is interesting how the single thermal properties of
the gas (thermal conductivity, specific heat capacity, density
and thermal diffusivity) influence the sensor signal. A big
challenge would be to determine all these properties.
Furthermore the thermal measurement principle changes the
gas properties itself. One point could be to investigate if
acoustic waves are generated by sinusoidal heating and
cooling of a gas.
The basic field of application for the sensor is to detect
changes in the composition of gas mixtures. Because the
measurement principle isnt selective for certain gas
components it cannot reach the accuracy of optical or
chemical sensors. With infrared sensors resolutions of
to detect CO
2
can be achieved. Our current sensor presented
here achieves a resolution under optimum conditions which is
equivalent to . Nevertheless the senor presented
here can be a low cost and low power consuming alternative
for some applications. In the following we illustrate two
potential applications.

1) Warning system
The sensor could be used to detect changes in gas
composition and send warning signals if the results are outside
a predefined range. For example if there is a leakage in a gas
bottle or pipe inside a room, the gas concentration can increase
dangerously. One concrete application could by the use as
warning system for gas storages in the gastronomy where
accidences can happen if someone enters a room with a CO
2

concentration of more than .
One further application could be the detection of the CO
2

concentration in working rooms. The PEL (permissible
exposure limit) given by the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA) is or . At the latest
at this value room ventilation should start to operate to avoid
tiredness. An even better solution would be to have a sensor
detecting the Pettenkofer value giving a limit for good indoor
air quality at . The sensor presented here cannot
detect simultaneous change of several different gas
constituents. Especially the cross sensitivity to humidity
would have to be considered for entering this field of
application.

2) CO
2
concentration in breathed air
Another challenging field of application is the artificial
breathing technology. The CO
2
concentration of exhaled air is
an important quantity to determine whether a ventilated lung is
healthy or not. Nowadays mostly infrared gas sensors in
external devices, connected over long tubes are used. They
have a very good selectivity for the CO
2
detection, but are
quite expensive and the resolution they offer is not necessarily
needed. A resolution of about

in air is enough to
determine a healthy lung. A healthy patient inhales room air
with about CO
2
and exhales air with CO
2
. Thus
the high selectivity of an IR sensor is not needed and the
presented system for thermal gas analysis could be an
Copyright (c) 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted. For any other purposes, permission must be obtained from the IEEE by emailing pubs-permissions@ieee.org.
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Sensors-7399-2012.R2 10
alternative. The largest challenge towards this application are
the varying temperature, pressure and humidity conditions
during operation. Solving these challenges through the low
power consumption and ability for miniaturization a patient-
friendly wearable, battery driven device could become
possible.

VII. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This work was funded by the German Federal Ministry of
Economics and Technology via grant No. 16046 N of the
German Federation of Industrial Research Associations
(AiF).
AUTHORS
K. Kliche: Kurt Kliche was born 1980 in Dillenburg, Germany. He studied
mechanical engineering focusing on microsystems and precision engineering
at the University of Stuttgart, Germany and finished his studies in August
2006. Since then he was employed at HSG-IMIT in Villingen-Schwenningen,
Germany as R&D engineer within the group "thermal sensors" in the division
"microfluidics". His work was mainly focused on the development of MEMS
based thermal sensors for the determination of gas properties.

G. Kattinger: Gerhard Kattinger was born in August 1962 in Schramberg,
Germany. He completed an apprenticeship as electrical technician and worked
11 years in automation, software and electrical design at Kern-Liebers in
Schramberg, Germany. Since 1999 he works at the HSG-IMIT in Villingen
Schwenningen. His focus is sensor electronics development and measurement
technology in the fields of thermal sensors and thermoelectric generators.

S. Billat: Sophie Billat studied physics at Grenoble University (France) and
received her diploma in 1991. Her Ph.D. in solid state physics at the Institute
of Spectrometry Physics in Grenoble was on the electroluminescence of
porous silicon. In 1995, she joined the Institute for Ion and Thin Layer
Technology of the KFA in Jlich, where she worked on superlattices with
porous silicon. Since 1998, she works in the field of thermal sensors, with an
emphasis on inclinometers, heat conductivity and flow sensors in the
microfluidics division at the HSG-IMIT in Villingen-Schwenningen,
Germany.

L. Shen: Liwei Shen, was born in April 1989 in Hunan Province, PR China.
He studied mechatronics with specialization in automation technology at
Tongji University, China and Esslingen University of Applied Sciences,
Germany. From March 2010 till January 2011 he joined the "Infrared
Transceiver for Robots" project and the "Motion Control" project at the
university. He carried out his bachelor thesis at HSG-IMIT in Villingen-
Schwenningen, Germany and graduated in August 2011.

S. Messner: Stephan Messner was born in October 1967 in Schwenningen
a.N., Germany. He studied Mechanical Engineering at the University of
Stuttgart (Germany) and graduated in 1993. Since 1994 he works at HSG-
IMIT in Villingen-Schwenningen (Germany). He received a PhD from
University of Freiburg (Germany) in 2000. Since 2002 he is heading the
microfluidics division at HSG-IMIT focusing on micro dosage systems, micro
valves and pumps, as well as flow and humidity sensors. In March 2012 he
left HSG-IMIT to take over the position of a professor at the Furtwangen
University of Applied Research.

R. Zengerle: heads the Laboratory for MEMS Applications at the IMTEK-
Department of Microsystems Engineering at the University of Freiburg,
Germany. In addition he is also a Director at the HSG-IMIT operating
facilities in Villingen-Schwenningen and Freiburg, Germany. His research is
focused on microfluidics and covers topics like miniaturized and autonomous
dosage systems, implantable drug delivery systems, nanoliter and picoliter
dispensing, lab-on-a-chip platforms, tools for research on cells, thermal
sensors, miniaturized fuel cells, as well as micro- and nanofluidics simulation.
Dr. Zengerle coauthored more than 200 technical publications and 30 patents.
He is an editor of the Springer Journal of Microfluidics and Nanofluidics.
Dr. Zengerle serves on the international steering committee of the MicroTAS
and Transducers conferences as well as on the technical program committees
of several other international conferences.
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