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Tailoring Thin-Film Piezoelectrics for Crash Sensing
Sudeep Joshi1,2, M M Nayak3, K Rajanna1
1Department of Instrumentation and Applied Physics (IAP), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, 560012, India.
Abstract:
Crash sensing and its assessment play a pivotal role in autonomous vehicles for preventing fatal casualties. Existing crash sensors are severely bottlenecked by sluggish response time, rigid mechanical components, and space constraints. Miniaturized sensors embedded with custom-tailored nanomaterials upholds potential to overcome these limitations. In this article, piezoelectric Zinc-Oxide thin film as a crash sensing layer is integrated onto a flexible metal-alloy cantilever. Material characterization studies are conducted to confirm piezoelectric property of sputtered ZnO film. The piezoelectric d 31 coefficient value of ZnO film was 7.2 pm V-1 . The ZnO sensing element is firmly mounted on a scaled car model and used in a crash sensing experimental set-up. A comprehensive theoretical analysis for two different real scenarios (nearly elastic and nearly inelastic collision) of crash events followed by experimental study is discussed. The crash sensor's output exhibits a linear relationship with magnitude of impact forces experienced at crash events. The response time of ZnO crash sensor is 18.2 ms, and it exhibits a sensitivity of 28.7 mV N-1 . The developed crash sensor has potential to replace bulk material sensors owing to its faster response time, high sensitivity, and compactness as the demand for crash sensors in next-generation automobile industries is progressively growing.
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