Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, the performance of the benzene gas detection sensor in the air is optimized by an experimental design method. So in this work, Nanostructured thin films of ZnO and Zn2SnO4 were prepared in wurtzite form via a facile atmospheric pressure chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method, using metallic zinc and tin precursors. Characterization of the gas sensor was performed by using Powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and surface area analysis (using BET method). The results show that Zn2SnO4 nanowire network exhibited good sensitivity at 299 °C temperature to low concentrations (100 ppb) of Benzene which can be potentially used as a resistive gas sensor.... 

Porous poly-silicon (PPS) is a cheaper alternative to single crystal porous silicon and is a favorable choice for making gas sensors. In this study, porous poly-silicon samples were prepared using different HF concentrations and the structural and gas-sensing properties were studied. The topography of the surface was investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) techniques. The variation of electrical conductivity of the samples in the presence of dry air-diluted acetone, ethanol and methanol showed that for a constant etching current, the sensitivity was highest for samples prepared in 13% HF solution. The structure of the films in the optimum HF... 

Design and construction of an optical fiber sensor for liquid level detection are reported. This sensor operates based on light intensity modulation, and such modulation results from alteration of total internal reflection into partial reflection at the interface. The modulated intensity has been measured by using a pair of fibers, one transmitting source light, another acting as receiving fiber, and a glass prism providing the total and partial reflections. During the level measurements, when a liquid in a vessel touches the 45° faces of the 45-90-45° prism, the total internal reflection is disturbed, and the reflected light is modulated. The performance of this sensor is tested with... 

New industries and production plants require a flexible system, which is capable of picking up objects of various shapes, weights, and colors with arbitrary position and orientation. Such a system also needs recognition and guiding sub-systems. The recognition system includes target function for the recognition sub-system and relation between object characteristics and recognition target. The laser sensor system can be used for such object recognition. Wire-based telemetry and control systems can cause many problems in shop floors and factories, and so there has been a strong growth of interest in wireless guidance like vehicles equipped with laser guiding and navigation systems. For the... 

Design and operation of an opto-mechanical sensor for mass measurements is reported. This device uses a pair of optical fibers and a reflecting coated lens. The light intensity modulation is based on the relative motion of the lens due to a given mass with respect to the optical fibers. The modulated intensity because of the weighing mass has been measured by using a digital voltmeter. A full-range sensitivity of about 11.5 mV/g for a dynamic range of 80 g is obtained. A mass resolution of better than 0.25 g has been measured with this device. The measured output response is checked against the expected theoretical one and a general agreement observed. A comparison with similar experimental... 

Design and operation of an optical fiber device for temperature sensing and thermal expansion measurement are reported. The modulated intensity has been measured by using a pair of 450 μm core fiber, one acting as the source and the other one as receiving fiber. In this design, the light intensity modulation is based on the relative motion of the optical fibers and a reflective coated lens. By using displacement calibration data for this sensor, the linear thermal expansion of the aluminum rod is determined. This sensor shows an average sensitivity of about 11.3 mV/°C for temperature detection and 7 μm/°C for thermal expansion detection. Device resolution for a linear expansion measurement... 

In this paper, application of a capacitive sensor system in recording small displacements is discussed. Through using a simple transducer and a monitoring circuit, change in capacitance has been detected as a function of the capacitor air-gap distance. There is a linear relation between gap distance and output of a sensor for a wide gap range of 0.5 to 5 mm. The reported system provides means for measuring displacements up to 5 mm with a resolution better than 250 nm. By decreasing the dynamic range of the transducer to 250 μm, a small displacement of the order of 100 nm is detectable. With the present system, a minimum displacement of about 200 nm (200 ppm) for the gap distance of 1 mm is... 

We prepared porous silicon samples coated by continuous palladium layer in electroless process. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) showed cauliflower-shape Pd clusters on the surface. I–V curves of Schottky like Pd/porous Si samples were measured in air and in hydrogen. These measurements showed a metal–interface–semiconductor configuration rather than an ideal Schottky diode. Variations of the electrical current in the presence of diluted hydrogen at room temperature revealed that the samples can sense hydrogen in a wide range of concentration (100–40,000 ppm) without any saturation behavior. Hydrogen sensing properties of these samples were investigated at room temperature for a duration... 

Recent advances in wireless sensor network (WSN) technology are enabling the deployment of large-scale and collaborative sensor networks. WSNs face several challenges such as security, localisation, and energy consumption. To resolve these issues, evolutionary algorithms can be helpful. The core of every evolutionary algorithm is its fitness function. The drawbacks of fitness functions used in the literature will be investigated and some solutions will be suggested. The simulation results clearly show the improvement due to suggested solutions. © The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2017  

In this paper, a distributed relative humidity (RH) or moisture sensor is proposed. The proposed structure is a single mode telecommunication optical fiber coated by humidity sensitive and insensitive polymers periodically. The polymer coated fiber is surrounded by a high Young's modulus material such as stainless steel mesh. The swelling of the coated Humidity Sensitive Polymers (HSPs) as a result of moisture absorption induces fiber gratings in the single mode fiber. Depending on the coating period relative to the light wavelength, the induced fiber grating can be Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) or Long Period Fiber Grating (LPFG). The light reflected by the induced FBG or losses due to the... 

A triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) electrode sensitive to the adsorption of water molecules has been introduced to create a self-powered humidity sensor. Graphene oxide (GO) nanosheets and graphene oxide nanoribbon (GONR) possessing oxygenated functional groups, as well as high dielectric constants, have been proposed as appropriate candidates for this purpose. GO papers have been fabricated in three forms, i.e. pure GO paper, uniform composites of GONR and GO, and double-layer structures of GONR on top of GO. Results showed that all of the prepared paper-based TENGs revealed excellent performances by maximum output voltage above 300 V. As active humidity sensors, the maximum voltage... 

In this paper, the distributed recovery units for FM and PPM demodulation in wireless sensor networks is proposed and is showed that, the method introduces very little amount of distortion to recovered signal. With simulations, we have examined several different parameters. Besides, two different filtering schemes are simulated. Effect of iteration coefficient (X) on stability and convergence rate is investigated for different sampling and filtering methods. Next, we have studied the noise effect in demodulation with this method. Simulations results are included to verify convergence. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2005  

In many wireless sensor network applications, nodes are mobile, while many protocols proposed for these networks assume a static network. Thus, it is important to evaluate if a traditional protocol designed for a static network can tolerate different levels of mobility. This paper provides an analytic model to investigate the effect of mobility on a well-known cluster-based protocol, LEACH. The model evaluates data loss after construction of the clusters due to node mobility, which can be used to estimate a proper update interval to balance the energy and data loss ratio. Thus, the results can help the network designer to adjust the topology update interval given a value of acceptable data... 

Limited energy in each node is the major design constraint in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). To overcome this limit, wireless rechargeable sensor networks (WRSNs) have been proposed and studied extensively over the last few years. In a typical WRSN, batteries in sensor nodes can be replenished by a mobile charger that periodically travels along a certain trajectory in the sensing area. To maximize the charged energy in sensor nodes, one fundamental question is how to control the traveling velocity of the charger. In this paper, we first identify the optimal velocity control as a key design objective of mobile wireless charging in WRSNs. We then formulate the optimal charger velocity... 

Human movement analysis is an important part of biomechanics and rehabilitation, for which many measurement systems are introduced. Among these, wearable devices have substantial biomedical applications, primarily since they can be implemented both in indoor and outdoor applications. In this study, a Trunk Motion System (TMS) using printed Body‐Worn Sensors (BWS) is designed and developed. TMS can measure three‐dimensional (3D) trunk motions, is lightweight, and is a portable and non‐invasive system. After the recognition of sensor locations, twelve BWSs were printed on stretchable clothing with the purpose of measuring the 3D trunk movements. To integrate BWSs data, a neural network data... 

Although, the optical flow sensors which are used in optical mouse have high resolution in measuring displacement, their error refrain us from a precise and reliable measurement. Besides, these sensors require calibration based on the surface. Their error has different sources and the most important is surface texture in micro level. In this research, we have worked to find surface conditions on which sensor measurement is more precise. For this aim, we used an 800 DPI low cost optical flow sensor. For making different surface textures and grains, we printed different textures with 600 and 1200DPI resolution on white paper with certain length. Then we used optical flow sensor for measuring... 

Nanocrystalline and nanostructured TiO2-Cr2O3 thin films and powders were prepared by a facile and straightforward aqueous particulate sol-gel route at low temperature of 400°C. The prepared sols showed a narrow particle size distribution with hydrodynamic diameter in the range of 17.7 nm to 19.0 nm. Moreover, the sols were stable over 4 months, with constant zeta potential measured during this period. The effect of the Cr:Ti molar ratio on the crystallization behavior of the products was studied. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis revealed that the powders crystallized at low temperature of 400°C, containing anatase-TiO2, rutile-TiO2, and Cr2O3 phases, depending on the annealing temperature... 

Pipelines are one of the most important and efficient ways for transporting energy like water, gas, oil and etc. between different places all across the world. As these pipelines are located in different conditions and situations, they are all sensitive to a wide variety of damages like vibration, so monitoring their structural behavior is an essential task. Monitoring pipeline vibration caused by cavitation through an orifice by a piezoelectric sensor is presented in this paper