Surface Acoustic Wave Microhygrometer
A microhygrometer has been developed at JPL's Microdevices Laboratory based on the Principle of dewpoint/frostpoint detection.
SEARCH · Search NASA
Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
A microhygrometer has been developed at JPL's Microdevices Laboratory based on the Principle of dewpoint/frostpoint detection.
A simple duel interferometer which uses two pairs of orthogonally polarized optical beams to measure both the amplitude and direction of propagation of broadband ultrasonic surface waves is described. Each pair of focused laser probe beams is used in a separate wideband differential interferometer to independently detect the component of surface wave motion along one direction on the surface. By combining the two output signals corresponding to both components, the two dimensional surface profile and its variation as a function of time is determined.
Updated aging data for SAW oscillators with aluminum transducers on ST-cut quartz, for gold transducers on ST-cut quartz, and for aluminum transducers on SiO2/LiTaO3. Devices with gold transducers age differently (both and shape of curve) from those having a aluminum transducers indicating the transducer metallization can represent an important aging mechanism.
Two 2.2 GHz SAW oscillators using aluminum nitride on sapphire (AlN/Al2O3) delay lines were fabricated. The oscillators were electronically temperature compensated and characterized. One of the oscillators was used as the frequency reference for the Ku band source; the second oscillator is available for continued evaluation. A 15 GHz frequency source was designed and fabricated. The 15 GHz source consists of a Ku band FET oscillator which is phase locked to the frequency multiplied (X7) output of the 2.2 GHz SAW reference source. The Ku band source was built using microstrip circuit designs, which are hybrid compatible. Two wafer runs of 2.2 GHz TED devices were fabricated and evaluated. The devices were mounted on microstrip test substrates and evaluated as 15 GHz divide by 7 circuits. The device evaluation indicated that in their present form the TED is not a practical circuit element.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
The development of a 200 MHz SAW instrument based on an SAW resonator instead of a conventional delay line is reported. The instrument is small, compact, and uses two separate 200 MHz resonataor crystals which operate in the dual difference mode. The difference frequency stability is better than 5 x 10 to the -9th (+ or - 1 Hz) which is comparable to a 10 MHz bulk crystal and at least an order of magnitude better than other commercially available SAW delay lines that operate at comparable frequencies. The mass sensitivity is about 9 x 10 to the 10th Hz sq cm/g. Response to temperature change is found to be about 20 Hz/C from -30 C to 30 C. Response to pressure is found to be linear from 760 to 415 Torr at 3 Hz/Torr. Detection limits for HCl vapors were determined to be in the low ppb range using an SAW resonator coated with triethanolamine.
This Final Report for the PSAW/MicroSWIS Program is provided in compliance with contract number NAS3-01118. This report documents the overall progress of the program and presents project objectives, work carried out, and results obtained. Program Conceptual Design Package stated the following objectives: To develop a sensor/transceiver network that can support networking operations within spacecraft with sufficient bandwidth so that (1) flight control data, (2) avionics data, (3) payload/experiment data, and (4) prognostic health monitoring sensory information can flow to appropriate locations at frequencies that contain the maximum amount of information content but require minimum interconnect and power: a very high speed, low power, programmable modulation, spread-spectrum radio sensor/transceiver.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
The present invention provides a delay line SAW device fabricated on a lithium niobate substrate and coated with a bilayer of nanocrystalline or other nanomaterials such as nanoparticles or nanowires of palladiumn and metal free pthalocyanine which will respond to hydrogen gas in near real time, at low (room) temperature, without being affected by CO, O.sub.2, CH.sub.4 and other gases, in air ambient or controlled ambient, providing sensitivity to low ppm levels.
No abstract provided
Acoustic waves omnidirectional scattering by rough imperfectly reflecting surfaces analyzed using physical optics method
An investigation of the technology and programmatics involved in the development of four of the products selected as capable of benefitting from space manufacturing was conducted. The four activities selected are as follows: (1) levitation heating and melting of tungsten, (2) free suspension processing of oxides to form amorphous oxide materials, (3) crystals for surface wave acoustic substrates, and (4) space manufacturing of surface acoustic wave devices.
High Q resonators are a critical component of stable, low-noise communication systems, radar, and precise timing applications such as atomic clocks. In electronic resonators based on Si integrated circuits, resistive losses increase as a result of the continued reduction in device dimensions, which decreases their Q values. On the other hand, due to the mechanical construct of bulk acoustic wave (BAW) and surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators, such loss mechanisms are absent, enabling higher Q-values for both BAW and SAW resonators compared to their electronic counterparts. The other advantages of mechanical resonators are their inherently higher radiation tolerance, a factor that makes them attractive for NASA s extreme environment planetary missions, for example to the Jovian environments where the radiation doses are at hostile levels. Despite these advantages, both BAW and SAW resonators suffer from low resonant frequencies and they are also physically large, which precludes their integration into miniaturized electronic systems. Because there is a need to move the resonant frequency of oscillators to the order of gigahertz, new technologies and materials are being investigated that will make performance at those frequencies attainable. By moving to nanoscale structures, in this case vertically oriented, cantilevered carbon nanotubes (CNTs), that have larger aspect ratios (length/thickness) and extremely high elastic moduli, it is possible to overcome the two disadvantages of both bulk acoustic wave (BAW) and surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators. Nano-electro-mechanical systems (NEMS) that utilize high aspect ratio nanomaterials exhibiting high elastic moduli (e.g., carbon-based nanomaterials) benefit from high Qs, operate at high frequency, and have small force constants that translate to high responsivity that results in improved sensitivity, lower power consumption, and im - proved tunablity. NEMS resonators have recently been demonstrated using topdown, lithographically fabricated ap - proaches to form cantilever or bridgetype structures. Top-down approaches, however, rely on complicated and expensive e-beam lithography, and often require a release mechanism. Reso - nance effects in structures synthesized using bottom-up approaches have also recently been reported based on carbon nanotubes, but such approaches have relied on a planar two-dimensional (2D) geometry. In this innovation, vertically aligned tubes synthesized using a bottom- up approach have been considered, where the vertical orientation of the tubes has the potential to increase integration density even further. The simulation of a vertically oriented, cantilevered carbon nanotube was performed using COMSOL Multi - physics, a finite element simulation package. All simulations were performed in a 2D geometry that provided consistent results and minimized computational complexity. The simulations assumed a vertically oriented, cantilevered nanotube of uniform density (1.5 g/cu cm). An elastic modulus was assumed to be 600 GPa, relative permittivity of the nanotube was assumed to be 5.0, and Poisson s ratio was assumed to be 0.2. It should be noted that the relative permittivity and Poisson s ratio for the nanotubes of interest are not known accurately. However, as in previous simulations, the relative permittivity and Poisson s ratios were treated as weak variables in the simulation, and no significant changes were recognized when these variables were varied.
Verifying the structural integrity of aeronautical vehicles is of critical importance for the safety of passengers and crew. When operating in a densely populated urban area, pedestrian safety and collateral damage to buildings and other infrastructure also become important concerns. Damage modes, including fatigue from an increased frequency of take-off and landing cycles and a higher probability of impacts from bird strikes, also pose different failure risks as compared to commercial long-haul aircraft and thus require a change in structural health monitoring philosophy. This presentation will review the state of the art in structural health monitoring with an eye toward applications for vertical lift systems operated in the urban environment. Structural health monitoring methods including eddy current, fiber optic, ultrasonic plate wave, surface acoustic wave and electrical impedance tomography will be explored for use in on-board monitoring of impact and overstrain events as well as damage detection and characterization. Infusion of the data into an early warning system to help ensure damage will not propagate to failure during flight will also be discussed.
In-situ analysis is a major goal in current and future NASA exploration missions. In general in-situ analysis experiments are designed to investigate chmical, biological or geological markers or properties to determine the complex history of the body being studied. In order to expand the number of applicable sensor schemes an investigation into piezoelectric bulk acoustic wave (BAW) and surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators has been initiated.
Brushlike arrays of carbon nanotubes embedded in microstrip waveguides provide highly efficient (high-Q) mechanical resonators that will enable ultraminiature radio-frequency (RF) integrated circuits. In its basic form, this invention is an RF filter based on a carbon nanotube array embedded in a microstrip (or coplanar) waveguide, as shown in Figure 1. In addition, arrays of these nanotube-based RF filters can be used as an RF filter bank. Applications of this new nanotube array device include a variety of communications and signal-processing technologies. High-Q resonators are essential for stable, low-noise communications, and radar applications. Mechanical oscillators can exhibit orders of magnitude higher Qs than electronic resonant circuits, which are limited by resistive losses. This has motivated the development of a variety of mechanical resonators, including bulk acoustic wave (BAW) resonators, surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators, and Si and SiC micromachined resonators (known as microelectromechanical systems or MEMS). There is also a strong push to extend the resonant frequencies of these oscillators into the GHz regime of state-of-the-art electronics. Unfortunately, the BAW and SAW devices tend to be large and are not easily integrated into electronic circuits. MEMS structures have been integrated into circuits, but efforts to extend MEMS resonant frequencies into the GHz regime have been difficult because of scaling problems with the capacitively-coupled drive and readout. In contrast, the proposed devices would be much smaller and hence could be more readily incorporated into advanced RF (more specifically, microwave) integrated circuits.
A wireless surface acoustic wave sensor includes a piezoelectric substrate, a surface acoustic wave device formed on the substrate, and an antenna formed on the substrate. In some embodiments, the antenna is formed on the surface of the substrate using one or more of photolithography, thin film processing, thick film processing, plating, and printing.