Ultra-High Sensitivity Ultrasonic Sensor with an Extrinsic All-Polymer Cavity

Zongyu Chen; Bo Dong; Wobin Huang; Yunji Yi; Chichiu Chan; Shuangchen Ruan; Shaoyu Hou

doi:10.3390/s22187069

Ultra-High Sensitivity Ultrasonic Sensor with an Extrinsic All-Polymer Cavity

Sensors (Basel). 2022 Sep 19;22(18):7069. doi: 10.3390/s22187069.

Authors

Zongyu Chen¹, Bo Dong¹, Wobin Huang¹, Yunji Yi¹, Chichiu Chan¹, Shuangchen Ruan¹, Shaoyu Hou¹

Affiliation

¹ College of Integrated Circuits and Optoelectronic Chips, Shenzhen Technology University, Shenzhen 518118, China.

Abstract

An ultra-high sensitivity ultrasonic sensor with an extrinsic all-polymer cavity is presented. The probe is constructed with a polymer ferrule and a polymer-based reflection diaphragm. A specially designed polymer cover is used to seal the cavity sensor head and apply pretension to the sensing diaphragm. It can be manufactured by a commercial 3D printer with good reproducibility. Due to its all-polymer structure and high coherence depth, the sensitivity of our proposed sensor is improved significantly compared with that of the other sensor structures. Its sensitivity is 189 times as great as that of the commercial standard ultrasonic sensor at the ultrasonic frequency of 50 KHz, and it has a good response to ultrasonic within the frequency range of 18.5 KHz-200 KHz.

Keywords: all-polymer cavity; fiber acoustic sensor; ultrasonic sensor.

Grants and funding

This research was funded by “General project of Shenzhen university stability support plan (SZWD2021006)”, “Guangdong university innovation team project (Natural cience) (2020KCXTD029)”, “Special projects in key fields of colleges and universities of Guangdong Province (2021ZDZX1013)”, “Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation of Guangdong Province Natural Science Foundation (2022A1515010841)”, “Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Macao Science and Technology plan (Class C) (SGDX20201103009520303)”, “Natural Science Foundation of Top Talent of SZTU (grant no. GDRC202103)” and “Guangdong Provincial Major Scientific Research Grant (Grant No. 2018KZDXM077); Stability Support Program Project of Universities in Shenzhen (Grant No. SZWD2021001)”.