On-chip integrated silicon bulk-micromachined soil moisture sensor based on the...

• Autor(es): Valente, A. ; Couto, Carlos ; Correia, J. H.
• Data: 2001
• Identificador Persistente: http://hdl.handle.net/1822/5426
• Origem: RepositóriUM - Universidade do Minho
• Assunto(s): Soil moisture sensor; Soil water content; Heat capacity sensor; Integrated microsensor
• Tipo de Documento: Documento de conferência
• Idioma: Inglês

Descrição

This paper reports the design, modelling, fabrication and assembly of a silicon bulk-micromachined soil moisture microsensor using the Dual-Probe Heat-Pulse (DPHP) method. Soil humidity measurement is essential to studysoil preservation and control the development of plants, namely in closed ecosystem. The DPHP method uses a heater (Peltier effect) and a temperature probe (Seebeck effect) to determine the volumetric heat capacity of the soil and hence water content ( θv). This is the first time that the DPHP method is implemented in a microdevice and the first integrated sensor for soil moisture. This microdevice is more suited to measure at different soil depths in a non-destructive and automated manner.