Abstract
Microelectromechanical system (MEMS)-based sensors for marine environment help to realize new systems that bring enhanced levels of perception, control, and performance to sonar systems and sensors related to marine environments. Processing, assembly, packaging, testing, and manufacturing methods are all highly dictated by the intended application of MEMS devices; hence, these disciplines are being honed up to meet the demands with new materials and performance requirements across a wide spectrum of underwater applications. Five basic parameters are measured in the ocean to define its physical state: temperature, salinity, pressure, density, and velocity of sound. These can be obtained using a pressure sensor, temperature detector, and a conductivity sensor. Biologically inspired MEMS shear stress sensors comprising a piezoresistive floating element offer the potential to make flow measurements in fluid with unprecedented sensitivity, and spatial and temporal resolution. In order to get finer resolution of underwater objects in turbid waters, it is imperative to work at MHz frequencies. Different types of transducers such as CMUT, PMUT, and Helmholtz resonator are also realized by MEMS fabrication and are readily scalable in size. In addition, multiplexing, pulsing, and pre-amplifying electronics can be easily integrated on the same chip with the transducers or on a separate chip via flip-chip bonding. This allows for 1D and 2D arrays of elements to be easily steered electronically. Thus, fabrication of a large number of transducers with built-in pre-amplifiers required in a planar array configuration is possible with MEMS-based technology.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Hayward G, Bennett J, Hamilton R (1995) A theoretical study on the influence of some constituent material properties on the behaviour of 1–3 connectivity composite transducer. J Acoust Soc Am 98(4):2187–2196
Swartz RG, Plummer JD (1979) Integrated silicon-PVF2 acoustic transducer array. IEEE Trans Electron Devices ED-26(12):1921–1931
Fiorillo AS, Spiegel JV, Bloomfield PE, Esmail-Xandi D (1990) A P(VDF-TrFE)—based integrated ultrasonic transducer. Sens Actuators, A21–A23:719–725
Uma G, Umapathy M, Sumy J, Natarajan V, Kathiresan M (2007) Design and simulation of PVDF-MOSFET based MEMS hydrophone. J Instrum Sci Technol 35(3)329–339
Zheng XR, Lai PT, Liu BY, Li B, Cheng YC (1997) An integrated PVDF ultrasonic sensor with improved sensitivity using polyimide. Sens Actuators A 63:147–152
Zhu B, Varadan VK (2002) Integrated MOSFET-based hydrophone device for underwater applications. In: Proceedings of SPIE on smart structures and materials 2002: smart electronics, MEMS, and nanotechnology, vol 4700, pp 101–110
Gopikrishna M, Natarajan V, Kathiresan M (2005) Proceedings of international conference on MEMS and semiconductor nanotechnology, vol TM1.7. IIT, Kharagpur, pp 12–13
Fries D, Steimle G, Natarajan S, Vanova S, Broadbent H, Weller T () Maskless lithographic PCB/laminate MEMS for a salinity sensing system. University of South Florida, USA
Rajeev RA, Thomas KA, Natarajan V (2009) Design, fabrication and evaluation of ‘zero external field’ conductivity cell for CTD. Proceedings of SYMPOL 2009, pp. 128–132
Thomas KA, Rajeev RA, Natarajan V (2012) Low-cost flexible micro conductivity and temperature sensor for oceanography applications. In: 5th ISSS National Conference on MEMS, Smart Structures & Systems (2012), pp.17–22
Clark SK, Wise KD (1979) Pressure sensitivity in anisotropically etched thin-diaphragm pressure sensors. IEEE Trans Electron Devices 26(12):1887–1896
Barlian AA, Park SJ, Mukundan V, Pruitt BL (2005) Design and characterization of microfabricated piezoresistive floating element-based shear stress sensors. In: Proceedings of IMECE 2005, pp 1–6
Barlian AA, Narain R, Li JT, Quance CE, Ho AC, Mukundan V, Pruitt BL () Piezoresistive MEMS underwater Shear Stress Sensors. In: MEMS 2006, Turkey, 22–26 Jan 2006, pp 626–629
Horowitz S et al (2004) A wafer-bonded, floating element shear-stress sensor using a geometric moire optical transduction technique. In: Solid-state sensor, actuator and microsystems workshop, USA, 2004
Saunvit P, Yingchen Y, Douglas LJ, Jonathan E, Chang L (2006) Multisensor processing algorithms for underwater dipole localization and tracking using MEMS artificial lateral-line sensors. EURASIP J Appl Signal Process 2006(Article ID 76593):1–8
Diana ZM, Natarajan V, Elizabeth R (2009) Design and simulation of piezoresistive flow sensor. In: SENNET 2009, international conference on sensors and related networks, VITU, India
Shipps JC, Abraham BM (2004) The use of vector sensors for underwater port and waterway security. In: Sensors for industry conference, New Orleans, USA, 27–29, pp 41–44, Jan 2004
Charles HS, John LB (2007) Transducers and arrays for underwater sound. Springer, Berlin
Chenyang X, Shang C, Wendong Z, Binzhen Z, Guojun Z, Hui Q (2007) Design fabrication and preliminary characterisation of a novel MEMS bionic vector hydrophone. Microelectron J 38:1021–1026
Amarsinghe R, Dao DV, Toriyama T, Sugiyama S (2005) Design and fabrication of miniaturized six-degree of freedom piezoresistive accelerometer. In: MEMS 2005 conference, pp 351–354, 2005
van Kampen RP, Wolffenbuttel RF (1998) Modelling the mechanical behaviour of bulk-micromachined silicon accelerometers. Sens Actuators A 64:137–150
Roshna BR, Natarajan V () A novel MEMS vector sensor. In: ISSS-NC6, 6–7 Sep 2013, Pune, India
Chenyang X, Shang C, Hui Q, Wendong Z, Jijun X, Binzhen Z, Guojun Z (2008) Development of a novel two axis piezoresistive micro accelerometer based on silicon. Sensor Lett 6:1–10
Ladabaum X, Jin HT, Atalar A, Khuri-Yakub BT (1998) Surface micromachined capacitive ultrasonic transducers. IEEE Trans Ultrason Ferroelectr Freq Control 45:678–690
Omer O, Ergun AS, Cheng CH, Johnson JA, Karaman M, Khuri-Yakub BT (2002). Underwater acoustic imaging using capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducer arrays. In: IEEE OCEANS’02, vol 4, pp 2354–2360
Oralkan O, Ergun AS, Johnson JA, Karaman M, Demirci U, Kaviani K, Lee TH, Khuri-Yakub BT (2002) Capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducers: next generation arrays for acoustic imaging. IEEE Trans Ultrason Ferroelectr Freq Control 49:1596–1610
Anil A, Ramgopal, Maheshkumar, Pant BD, Dwivedi VK, Chandrashekhar, Babar A, Rudrapratap, George PJ (2008) Fabrication of capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducer using wafer bonding technique. Sens Transduc J 93(6):15–20
Suresh G, Natarajan V, Srijith K, Raghavan S (2013) Design and modelling of 1Â MHz CMUT for underwater applications. In: Acoustics 2013, New Delhi, India
Acknowledgments
The authors thank the Director, NPOL for the encouragement and permission to publish this work, and his colleagues for discussions on sensors.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer India
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Natarajan, V. et al. (2014). MEMS Sensors for Underwater Applications. In: Vinoy, K., Ananthasuresh, G., Pratap, R., Krupanidhi, S. (eds) Micro and Smart Devices and Systems. Springer Tracts in Mechanical Engineering. Springer, New Delhi. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-1913-2_29
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-1913-2_29
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New Delhi
Print ISBN: 978-81-322-1912-5
Online ISBN: 978-81-322-1913-2
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)