An Electronic System for the Thermal Management
of MOX Sensors
A. Depari, A. Flammini, D. Marioli, E. Sisinni
Dept. of Information Engineering
University of Brescia
Brescia, Italy
alessandro.depari@ing.unibs.it
Abstract— MOX sensors are widely used in several application
fields: environmental monitoring, home automation, food
control, and so on. Research activities in this topic are oriented
towards new materials and nanotechnologies, thus requiring new
instruments for the sensor characterization and management.
Often, in order to improve selectivity, sensitivity, stability, the
sensor is heated according to purposely-designed profiles. The
repeatability of the measurement conditions strongly depends on
the ability to perform a sensor resistance measurement in a
synchronous fashion with respect to the imposed thermal profile.
This work proposes an electronic equipment for a complete and
synchronous management of a generic MOX sensor, showing a
resistance varying from tens of kilohms up to tens of gigohms.
First experimental results encourage its use with real sensors.
Keywords-wide-range resistances, parasitic capacitance
estimation, sensor heater management, synchronous measurement
I. INTRODUCTION
Metal oxide sensors (MOX) are used as gas sensors in
several applications: environmental monitoring, food and
beverage quality control, home safety and automation
applications, and so on. The research works in this field deal
with improving the sensitivity, the selectivity, the stability and
the repeatability of such devices by exploring new materials
and new fabrication techniques, such as nanowires [1], [2].
More in general, the working principle of MOX sensors
derives from chemical interactions between the gas under
inspection and the surface of the sensitive part of the device,
leading to a change of the electric conductance of the material.
Such interactions occur when the sensor operates at determined
temperature values, usually on the order of hundreds of Celsius
degrees. For this reason, when manufacturing the device, a
heater element is embedded together with the sensitive part and
a correct management of the sensor heating needs to be
assured. Beside a normal heating management, in which the
sensor is kept at a constant temperature, different techniques
based on the sensor temperature modulation can be explored
[3]. More generally, some research activities exploit the sensor
behavior, in terms of sensitivity, selectivity and repeatability,
as a function of thermal excitation [4].
A first simplified model of a MOX sensor consists in a
resistor Rs; due to the aforementioned variability of the
operating conditions (materials, manufacturing, temperature),
978-1-4244-8064-7/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE
E. Comini, A. Ponzoni
CNR-IDASC SENSOR Lab and Dept. of Chemistry and
Physics
University of Brescia
Brescia, Italy
dealing with MOX sensors means being able to measure
resistance values over a wide range of variability, from a few
kilohms up to hundreds gigohms. In addition, manufacturing
the heater on the same substrate and other effects due to the
sensor interconnections introduce a capacitive parasitic effect
[5]. A more accurate model takes into account this parasitic
effect, by adding a capacitor Cs of few picofarads in parallel
with the resistance Rs [6].
From the electronic interface point of view, the problem of
measuring such a wide range of resistances is not simple, even
considering that very high resistance values (up to hundreds of
gigohms) need to be estimated as well. Beside the use of
commercial and expensive picoammeters, many alternative
solutions are present in literature, based both on the classical
resistance estimation method or on the measure of time
intervals correlated to the resistance under examination [7]-[9].
It should be noticed that laboratory experiments normally
use an arbitrary waveform generator to heat the sensor with a
purposely-designed thermal profile and a picoammeter to
measure the high value of sensor resistance, but a synchronous
sampling is difficult to realize, thus limiting the repeatability of
the measurement conditions. This work proposes an electronic
equipment for the thermal excitation and analysis of MOX
sensor behavior which takes advantages from a synchronous
sampling method, thus assuring the repeatability of the
measurement conditions.
The paper is organized with the first two sections
describing the sensor resistance and capacitance measurement
and the heating electronic system. Section IV illustrates the
proposed logic circuits that manage timings of the whole
system, ensuring the synchronous sampling. Some preliminary
experimental results and related discussions are provided in the
last section.
II. SENSOR SENSITIVE PART MANAGEMENT
The proposed system adopts an estimation method based on
the combination of a resistance-to-time conversion (RTC) and
an interpolation algorithm based on the least mean square
(LMS) line [10], [11]. As shown in Fig. 1, it is basically
composed by an integrator Int which generates and output
signal Vo depending on the current Is flowing through the
sensor.
 If the highest threshold Vth-h is crossed before the time Tmeas
SWR
Sensor is expired (i.e. Th < Tmeas), then the slope  can be estimated by
C Cs means of (2).
Vexc
Is Vs
Vo 
SWC Vth h  Vth l Vth h  Vth l (2)
Rs D
+ Th l Th  Tl
Int
Voltage Vth-h and Vth-l can be considered as “a-priori”
+ known values, whereas Th-l varies according to the sensor
Vth-l
resistance. A deep analysis of uncertainty sources can be found
 in [12]. This method has an upper limit of sensor resistance it
Compl
can estimate; in fact, if Rs is too high, according to (1),  can
+
become too small and the output ramp Vo would not be able to
Digital cross the threshold Vth-h within the measuring time Tmeas. In
Vth-h
 such a case, the system operates the second estimation method,
Comph called LMS, which is based on sampling of the output ramp Vo
and on using an interpolation algorithm by means of the LMS
A/D line. With such an approach, the estimation of the slope  of
the ramp can be obtained starting from a suitable number N of
samples. The sampling of Vo is performed by an A/D converter
Figure 1. Block scheme of the sensor interface for the sensor resistance and correctly synchronized with the output ramp by means of the
the parasitic capacitance estimation.
Digital block (see Fig. 1 and Fig. 2). Once the number of
When the switch SWc is kept in the upper position, the samples N and the sampling rate Fs = 1/Ts has been decided, a
sensor excitation voltage Vs is driven by a constant and positive lower limit of sensor resistance exists. In fact, according to (1),
voltage Vexc, leading the output voltage Vo to be a falling ramp,  can become too high and in this situation it can happen that
the slope  of which is related to the sensor resistance value Vo reach the negative saturation voltage of the integrator before
according to (1). The switch SWR is used to stop the integration all the N samples have been acquired, thus leading to a wrong
process by forcing Vo to zero when closed; when open, the line interpolation. If the N samples are available related to time
integrator start working normally, thus this switch is also used Th, the accuracy of this method depends on the arithmetic
as a trigger for starting an estimation cycle. operations used to compute the slope of the LMS line and on
the noise of the samples, which is mainly due to the A/D
converter resolution. If the ENOB (effective number of bits) of
Vexc (1) the A/D converter is equal to B and the A/D converter has an
D
Rs C input range from 0 to Vin,max, the maximum measurable ramp
slope is less than max = Vin,max/Th, whereas the minimum
The estimation of  is performed by using two different
detectable ramp slope is more than min = max/2B.
methods simultaneously. The first one, in the following called
RTC, takes advantage from the measurement of the time In conclusion, both RTC and LMS methods have a limited
intervals that the ramp requires to cross two different threshold measurement range but they are based on the same hardware
values: Vth-l and Vth-h. Two comparators (Compl and Comph in and together they can cover a very wide range. For this reason,
Fig. 1) and two counters implemented in the Digital block are the system needs to be designed so that for every resistance
used for this purpose. As shown in Fig. 2, a measuring cycle is value in the considered range, at least one of the described
composed by a reset phase (determined by the switch SWR) methods is working.
with duration Tres, and by the ramp itself, which crosses the
threshold voltages Vth-l and Vth-h at Tl and Th respectively. After In the developed prototype, the parameters have been
a fixed and determined time Tmeas, the estimation cycle is chosen as follows: Tmeas = 10 ms, Vexc = 1 V, C = 100 pF,
stopped and a new cycle begins with the reset phase. Vth-l = 1 V, Vth-h = 10 V, N = 16, and Ts = 0.5 ms. With such
values, the upper limit of Rs for the RTC method is about
Tres Th 10 M, whereas the lower limit for the LMS one is about
Vo Tl Th-l 8 M, thus guarantying a complete resistance range coverage;
the partial overlap of the two approaches can be used for
t calibration purposes. A Texas Instrument A/D converter
Vth-l (ADS8422) with 15 bits of ENOB has been used; as
 Ts min = max/2B, then Rmin = Rmax/2B, thus the maximum
detectable sensor resistance is Rmax = 215·8 M  250 G.
samples
The lower limit of the overall resistance range is mainly
Vth-h determined by the slew-rate of the integrator and by the time
Tmeas resolution of the counters adopted for the time interval
measurements; if the time intervals become too short, the
Figure 2. Integrator output during a measurement cycle. counters would not able to furnish measurements with a
suitable accuracy. The operational amplifier used to realize the
integrator (ACF 2101 from Texas Instruments) has a slew-rate
of about 1 V/μs, thus limiting the minimum resistance Rs value
to about 10 k. Considering such a resistance limit, the
shortest time interval to measure (i.e. Tl, see Fig. 2) is about
1 μs; in the developed prototype, 50 ns-resolution counters
have been implemented, leading to a resolution of about 2% for
the measurements in the aforementioned worst case.
Conversely, the upper limit of the overall resistance range
is due to the non-idealities of the components used to realize
the integrator. In particular, the input bias current of the
operational amplifier could interfere with the measurement,
when the current Is is very small (i.e. when Rs is very high, see
Fig. 1). Similarly, the off-state resistance of the reset switch
SWR, which is included in the ACF 2101 IC, must be as high as
possible, not to create an alternative path for Is and therefore
affect the correct current integration. According to data
provided by the ACF 2101 documentation, such input bias
current is on the order of 100 fA, whereas the off-state
resistance of SWR is on the order of 1000 G. For these
reasons, only resistance values up to about 100 G can be
estimated with a minimal effect of such component
non-idealities.
Summarizing, the system is able to estimate the sensor film
resistance Rs in the range 10 k ÷ 100 G. Such a wide range
(seven decades) is covered without any scaling factor change,
but by using two different estimation approaches which
operates simultaneously: RTC for the lower part of the range,
up to 10 M, and LMS for the upper part of the range, starting
from 8 M.
Moreover, the system is able to estimate the sensor parasitic
capacitance Cs of the sensor, up to about 50 pF. To perform
such an operation, the sensor excitation voltage Vs is
temporarily driven to zero by means of the switch SWC, as
shown in Fig. 1. To limit the effect of such a variation on the
sensor resistance estimation, the switch SWC is activated only
during the reset phase, as shown in Fig. 3.
Vs Tres
Vexc
Vo
Vo  Th-l
Vth-l

samples
Vth-h
Th
Tmeas
Figure 3. Sensor excitation voltage and integrator output during the sensor
parasitic capacitance estimation
When exiting the reset phase, thus beginning a new
measuring cycle, SWC restores the usual sensor excitation
voltage Vexc; however such a voltage step on Vs determines, by
means of the charge transfer effect between Cs and C, a voltage
step Vo on the output ramp Vo. The relationship between the
magnitude of Vo and the sensor parasitic capacitance Cs is
given by (3).
'Vo Cs (3)
Vexc C
In case Rs is in the range of validity of the RTC method,
that is the output voltage Vo crosses both the threshold voltages
Vth-l and Vth-h, Vo can be easily reckoned inverting (4).
Th Vth  h  'Vo (4)
Th l Vth  h  Vth l
Conversely, if the time intervals Tl and Th are not available,
the LMS algorithm can be adopted; it should be noticed that
such an approach furnishes both the line slope  and the line
offset  with respect to the zero axis (see Fig. 3). In this case, it
is evident that Vo = . In both cases, once Vo has been
obtained, the estimation of Cs can be done by inverting (3). The
Rs estimation can be performed as usual, without being affect
by the parasitic capacitance value.
III. SENSOR HEATER MANAGEMENT
As stated before, sensors need to operate at a suitable
temperature, determined by the characteristics of the sensors
itself and by the specific application. Usually, sensors are
provided with a platinum filament embedded, which works as a
heater element when an electric current flows through it. In
fact, the filament shows a resistive behavior; by means of the
Joule effect, it converts the provided electric power into
thermal power, thus heating the substrate where the filament
itself and the sensitive part are realized. Due to the small size
of the substrate area, the filament and the sensitive part (i.e. the
whole sensor), we can assume that all such elements have the
same temperature Ts.
The simplest way to drive the heater is to apply a constant
voltage Vh; the filament is modeled by a resistor Rh(Ts) the
value of which is related to the temperature Ts of the sensor by
t means of (5), where T is the linear temperature coefficient of
the heater material (usually platinum) and Rh(Ts,0) is the
resistance value that the filament shows at the reference
t temperature Ts,0.
Rh (Ts ) Rh (Ts , 0 ) ˜ (1  D T (Ts  Ts , 0 )) (5)
If the current Ih flowing through the filament is estimated,
then it is possible to obtain the present value of the heater
resistance: Rh(Ts) = Vh / Ih. The value of the present sensor
temperature Ts can be obtained by inverting (5) once an initial
calibration of Rh(Ts,0) is made at the known temperature Ts,0.
Alternatively, from the measurement of Ih it is possible to
compute the electric power issued to the heater: Ph = Vh ·Ih.
From Ph, by means of suitable tables experimentally deduced
considering the sensor package, the room temperature, the flux
of the gas and so on, it is possible to estimate the value of the
sensor temperature Ts.
 In MOX sensors, usually the heater resistance value can The estimation of Vsh is carried out by means of an
vary in the range 10 ÷ 50  according to the sensor instrumentation amplifier (INA in Fig. 4) followed by an A/D
temperature, which can be up to 500°C. The power needed to converter. The digitalized value of VADC is then provided to the
reach such temperature values can be up to 1 W, which can be management block Digital. Without loss of generality, if we
obtained with driving voltages on the order of few volts. suppose the amplification of the INA stage to be unitary
(VADC = Vsh), then the heater resistance Rh and power Ph can be
It is evident that a system designed to control the sensor reckoned by (6) and (7) respectively.
temperature must be able to:
x issue a tunable voltage Vh to the heater; Vtot VDAC (6)
Rh
x provide the suitable electric power Ph to reach the Vsh VADC
Rsh Rsh
requested temperature;
x measure the current Ih flowing through the filament, Ph Vtot ˜
Vsh
VDAC ˜
VADC (7)
making possible to estimate both Rh(Ts) and Ph. Rsh Rsh
The block scheme of the electronic circuit developed to As will be clear in the following section, with such an
manage the sensor heater is shown in Fig. 4, where the sensor approach, the system is able to change the heater voltage and to
sensitive part management block, previously discussed, is also estimate the sensor temperature in an easy way, allowing
summarized. different kind of thermal profiles to be adopted.
Vpw VDAC
D/A IV. SYSTEM MANAGEMENT
+
As visible in Fig. 1 and Fig. 4, Digital is the block devoted
Q OP
 to the whole system management. In the proposed prototype, it
Vtot has been realized by means of a programmable logic device; in
particular, a Cyclone CPLD from Altera has been used. The
+ principle scheme of the functions performed by this block is
VADC Digital
Vsh A/D shown in Fig. 5; to facilitate the development of the VHDL
Rsh  program for the system implementation, a hierarchical structure
INA has been adopted, dividing in different modules the main
Ih
Sensor operations of the system.

Vh Rh Rs Sensitive Part
Management Oscillator Reset
RS-232
Digital
Figure 4. Block scheme of the sensor heater management section as a part of Timing Communication
the complete system. management

The tunable heater supply voltage Vh is provided by means

of a D/A converter, suitably interfaced with the system
management block Digital. The OP-Q pair is needed to realize
an amplifier with an output current boost. In fact, due to the
low value of the heater resistance Rh, the current Ih can be up to
some hundreds of milliampere; the MOS transistor Q can drive
such a value of current to the heater, while the feedback at the
operational amplifier forces the voltage at the transistor source
Vtot to the value VDAC applied by the D/A converter
(Vtot = VDAC).
It is worth to notice that Vtot is not the voltage actually
applied to the sensor heater. In fact, the need of estimating the
current Ih, requires a shunt resistor Rsh to be connected in the
same current path, in a voltage divider scheme. Since the
current Ih flows through Rsh, a voltage drop Vsh is generated,
thus reducing the supply voltage Vh of the sensor heater to
Vh = VDAC-Vsh. As will be clear in the following, this is not a big
issue for the overall mechanism of system; anyway, the Rsh
value is chosen to be smaller than Rh, to limit the voltage loss
on Vh, but not too small, in order to generate a voltage drop Vsh
which can be easily measured with a suitable resolution. In the
proposed system, Rsh  1 .
Heater Sensitive part
management management
Sensor
Figure 5. Scheme of the modules implemented in the system management
block Digital.
The module Timing management is devoted to the
generation of all the correct temporizations for the system,
starting from the external timing source Oscillator, which
provides a 20 MHz signal. In particular, every operation of the
system is performed according to the measuring cycle
Tmeas = 10 ms; this means that for every cycle, the system
provides an estimation of the Rs and Cs and it is possible to set
a new heater voltage Vh and to read the heater resistance Rh or
power Ph. In this way, the synchronization of the sensor
measurement and the sensor heating is guaranteed.
 The module Sensitive part management includes the control TABLE I. RESULTS CONCERNING THE SENSOR RESISTANCE ESTIMATION
of the sensor interface of the scheme in Fig. 1; therefore, it RTC LMS
issues the correct command signals for the switches SWR and Rs
Rel std Lin. Err Rel std Lin. Err
[M]
SWC, it manages the A/D converter by starting the N % % % %
conversions and acquiring the conversion results, and it 1E-2 0.01 -8.97 NA NA
implements the counters for the Tl and Th estimation. The 1E-1 0.02 -0.91 NA NA
module Heater management controls the sensor heater 1E+0 0.02 0.16 NA NA
interface of the scheme in Fig. 4; therefore, it sets the correct 1E+1 0.01 0.11 <0.01 -0.76
1E+2 NA NA 0.04 -1.01
heater voltage Vh by communicating with the D/A converter,
1E+3 NA NA 0.25 -1.12
and it samples the Vsh voltage by enabling conversions and 1E+4 NA NA 2.71 -1.14
reading the results from the A/D converter. It also implements 1E+5 NA NA 10.99 -1.15
the different heating techniques, by choosing the appropriate
heater voltage to apply. In the present realization, three TABLE II. RESULTS CONCERNING THE SENSOR PARASITIC CAPACITANCE
different choices are possible: ESTIMATION WITH RS = 10 M.

x constant heater voltage Vh, chosen by the user; RTC LMS

Cs Rs = 10 M Rs = 10 M
x pulsed heater voltage, where two different values for [pF] Rel std Lin. Err Rel std Lin. Err
Vh are chosen by the user together with the period (in % % % %
steps of Tmeas = 10 ms) and the duty-cycle of the 0 0.15 0.02 0.06 0.02
1 0.14 0.11 0.07 0.12
desired pulsed thermal profile; 2.2 0.12 -0.21 0.08 -0.23
x custom waveform, where the user creates a custom 4.7 0.16 0.03 0.07 0.03
thermal profile by listing the desired Vh values to apply 15 0.14 0.08 0.06 0.10
10 0.16 -0.13 0.06 -0.15
in each cycle. 22 0.15 0.30 0.07 0.31
Finally, the Communication block implements and RS-232 33 0.16 -0.32 0.07 -0.32
47 0.14 0.11 0.06 0.13
link to a PC, where a human interface in LabVIEW
environment allows the user to interact with the system and to
elaborate and save data of the measurements for an offline TABLE III. RESULTS CONCERNING THE SENSOR PARASITIC CAPACITANCE
ESTIMATION WITH DIFFERENT RS VALUES.
analysis. It is worth to notice that, in this implementation, the
RTC and LMS computations are actually performed by the PC Lin Err % Lin Err %
by means of the human interface application, but in a future Cs RTC LMS
[pF] Rs Rs Rs Rs Rs Rs
realization they could be executed directly by the Digital block. 100 k 1 M 100 M 1 G 10 G 100 G
0 0.01 0.01 -0.01 0.01 0.02 -0.01
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS 1 0.31 0.11 0.10 0.12 0.15 0.13
2.2 -0.13 -0.24 -0.22 -0.23 -0.28 -0.21
Some experimental tests have been performed to 4.7 -0.03 0.05 -0.03 0.01 0.01 0.03
characterize the system. At first, the sensor has been emulated 15 0.09 0.16 0.14 0.11 0.13 0.11
by means of commercial resistors (10 k ÷ 1 G 1%, 10 G 10 -0.11 0.04 0.01 -0.03 0.01 -0.02
5%, 20 G ÷ 100 G 10%) for the Rs, and capacitors 22 -0.19 0.08 0.20 0.20 0.17 0.14
(1 pF ÷ 2.2 pF 10%, 4.7 pF 5%, 10 ÷ 47 pF 2%) taking into 33 -0.24 -0.42 -0.35 -0.31 -0.31 -0.32
account Cs. For each combination of Rs and Cs, 100 47 0.25 0.21 0.10 0.14 0.12 0.16
measurements have been taken and the mean values have been
The system has been furthermore tested in a realistic
used to perform a linearization of the data. In particular, due to
environment, by using a real MOX sensor to detect different
the wide range of resistance variation, the linearization of the
concentrations of carbon monoxide (CO). In particular, an
Rs data have been carried out by means of the weighted least
experimental SnO2 nanowire-based sensor has been adopted.
mean square line, whereas for the Cs linearization, the normal
The test chamber has been kept at a controlled temperature of
approach by means of least mean square line has been adopted.
20°C and relative humidity of 20% for all the considered
TABLE I shows the results related to the Rs estimation, in experiments. A constant flux of 0.3 slm of synthetic air or
terms of linearity error and standard deviation. It is clear that mixture of synthetic air and CO in different concentrations has
the linearity error is below 10% in the whole considered range been utilized. In particular, three CO concentrations (50, 100,
of seven decades, whereas it decreases to about 1% if a reduced and 150 ppm) have been tested sequentially for 20 minutes
range of six decades (100 k ÷ 100 G) is considered. The each, separated by recover phases (only synthetic air) of 40
relative standard deviation of 10% with Rs = 100 G fits with minutes.
the maximum detectable value of Rs, which is about 250 G.
In the first experiment, the sensor heater is driven by a
TABLE II and TABLE III report the experimental results constant voltage of about 2.6 V, which leads to a heater power
for the Cs estimation, with Rs = 10 M and with other Rs values of about 400 mW (for the sensor under examination, the sensor
respectively; the linearity error is 0.35% all over the resistance temperature is about 350°C). Fig. 6 reports the data acquired
and capacitance range. with the proposed system referred to the sensor resistance Rs
during the aforementioned experiment.

150 ppm
100 ppm
50 ppm
Rs [M]
time [s]
Figure 6. Sensor resistance during the test with constant heater power.
To validate the heater management block and the capability
of the interface system of acquiring the sensor resistance when
the sensor temperature is varied, a pulsed heating strategy has
been adopted for the subsequent tests. Two different heater
voltage frequencies and two duty-cycle values have been
adopted. To compare such tests with the one related to a
constant heating strategy, the average power issued to the
sensor has been kept constant to 400 mW. For such a reason,
the heater voltage has been increased according to the used
frequency and duty-cycle. In Fig. 7 the data referred to the test
with heater voltage frequency of 2.5 Hz and duty-cycle of 50%
are reported. For each heating cycle, 40 samples of Rs are taken
by the instrument; since the sensor temperature is not constant
within the heating cycle, the Rs value sensibly changes from
sample to sample.
50 ppm
150 ppm
100 ppm
Rs [M]
time [s]
Figure 7. Sensor resistance during the test with heater voltage frequency of
2.5 Hz and duty-cycle of 50% (dark blue: heater ON; light green: heater OFF).
Therefore, in Fig. 7 a family of curves are visible, each of
which is related to a single Rs sample within the heating cycle;
the curves in dark blue are related to the samples taken when
the heater is in the ON state, the curves in light green when the
heater is in the OFF state. To better understand this point,
Fig. 8 shows a detail of Fig. 7 during three consecutive heating
cycles inside the 100 ppm zone. It is worth to notice that when
the heater is ON, the sensor resistance Rs decreases, due to the
increment of the sensor temperature; vice versa, when the
heater is OFF, Rs increases, because the sensor temperature is
decreasing. Such a resistance variation happens beside the
variation due to the interaction with the gas under examination,
which is however a phenomena not visible when considering
such short time intervals.
heater OFF
heater OFF
heater OFF
heater ON
heater ON
heater ON
Rs [M]
time [s]
Figure 8. Detail of Fig. 7 in the 100 ppm zone (pulsed heating strategy;
heater voltage frequency: 2.5 Hz; duty-cycle: 50%).
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