The widespread use of Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) for cooking and as fuel for automobile vehicles requires fast and selective detection of LPG to precisely measure the leakage of gas for preventing the occurrence of accidental explosions. The adoption of Micro-Electro-Mechanical-System (MEMS) technology for fabricating the gas sensor provides other potential advantages for sensing applications, which includes low power consumption, low fabrication cost, high quality, small size and reliability. MEMS based gas sensor requires a sensitive layer of oxide material like ZnO, SnO2, TiO2, Fe2O3, etc. The tin oxide material used in the present work changes its electrical properties, as it interacts with the reducing gas like LPG. The sensor material becomes active only at high temperature such as 400ºC, thereby realizing the need of a micro heater to reach the desired temperature. To control the temperature of micro heater and to determine the change in electrical properties of the sensor due to its interaction with LPG an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) forms an essential constituent of the MEMS based gas sensor. In the present work, an attempt has been made to improve the sensitivity of LPG gas sensor and it is correlated with other properties by different characterization techniques. The work also includes the design as well as testing of ASIC for gas sensor system. Process parameters particularly deposition time and substrate temperature have a profound influence on the microstructure of the tin oxide film, which in turn affects the gas sensing properties. To study the effects of these parameters, RF magnetron sputtering system is used for depositing tin oxide films onto the silicon substrate, which is compatible with CMOS technology. The effects of structural properties, optical properties and the porosity of the films are also studied and correlated with the gas sensing properties. In this direction the deposited films are characterized using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) to determine the structure orientation. The morphology of the sensor films are analyzed by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) while the refractive index, thickness and porosity of the films are determined using ellipsometry studies. The thickness of the deposited films is also confirmed by the surface profilometer. The change in composition of the deposited film along its depth is determined using Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometer (SIMS). Maximum sensitivity 5.5 is obtained for 470 nm thick films, which corresponds to a grain size of 38nm at the operating temperature of 4000C. Following these studies, an ASIC has been designed using Tanner EDA Tools on AMIS 0.7 µm CMOS process, fabricated through Euro practice’s ASIC prototyping service, Belgium and tested successfully after fabrication. The temperature control module of ASIC has been designed using relaxation oscillator technique to control the temperature of the in house developed heater. The resistance to period conversion technique is explored for the design of the sensor read out module of ASIC. The heater is integrated successfully with the sensor film, ASIC and microcontroller based LCD module. The test results show good agreement with the simulation results.

The replacement of chromate conversion coatings for zinc coated components has been necessitated by the materials finishing industries due to the inherent toxicity issues with Cr(VI) and the legislative enforcement of WEEE and ELV Directives by the European Union. Current replacements are based on non-chromate , Cr(III) systems, these may be perceived by some to be problematic as they still contain chromium . Molybdate based conversion coatings have long been viewed by many researchers to be a viable non-chromium alternative due to their low toxicity. An extensive literature review of the research carried out in the last 20 years was carried out, highlighting areas of interest for improving the corrosion resistance of the coatings studied. These were, primarily, the synergesis that exists with molybdate and phosphate compounds for corrosion resistance and the incorporation of nanoparticle silica into treatment solution. Also discovered was the importance of the acid used to adjust treatment solution pH, immersion time, oxidising agent additions and the incorporation of rare earth metal species. Silicate sealant layers were also highlighted as a post treatment. Molybdate-based coatings were formed on commercial electrodeposited acid zinc surfaces. Many treatment conditions were investigated, and initially performance analysed using DC Linear Polarisation Resistance (LPR) trials. Subsequently, the highest performing coatings were subjected to the more aggressive, industry standard, ASTM B 117 Neutral Salt Spray (NSS) corrosion test. The highest performing molybdate coatings were found to have an average LPR of ~ 9 000 Ω. cm2, in contrast to ~ 12 000 Ω. cm2 for the Cr(VI) based reference. NSS results were amongst the highest performing for molybdate based coatings documented, at 24 h until 5% white rust, however remained inferior to Cr(VI) coatings, which lasted 120 h. The highest performing coatings were characterised using FEG-SEM, Cryofracture EDXA and site specific AES. These techniques revealed that the enhanced molybdate coatings had a columnar structure that was around 300 nm thick, with pores that appeared to expose the substrate. AES showed this type of coating to have a mixed Mo, P and Zn oxide surface. Corrosion initiation was also studied; this can be thought of as an investigation to determine the point(s) of weakness or the mechanism that causes coating failure. Coatings were immersed in 5 % wt/ vol NaCl(aq) until they showed any surface change. Initial signs of corrosion were deemed to be any appearance of pitting or discolouration of the film, not a voluminous corrosion product. Untreated Zn, Cr(VI) and simple molybdate coatings were studied as well as enhanced molybdate coatings. There were clear differences in the way the coatings behaved at the onset of corrosion. Cr(VI) coatings delaminated, leaving an area of decreased Cr concentration. The enhanced molybdate coatings failed by the appearance of localised pores of ~ 70 µm in diameter. Substrate exposure was indisputably the reason for coating failure in chloride environments. In light of the work carried out in the present thesis the outlook for the use of molybdate as a potential replacement for chromate for the conversion coating of electrodeposited zinc surfaces is a positive one.

Xue Kun. / "July 2005." / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references. / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract in English and Chinese.

Diode lasers have many advantages such as small size, high efficiency and small angular dispersion of the collimated beam. However they also have some problems like lack of frequency stability. They can not be tuned in wavelength. An external cavity can solve these problems and decrease the laser linewidth. To obtain a tunable, narrow linewidth light source, antireflection coatings were applied to commercial diode lasers which were then tested in an external cavity. Laser characteristics, such as threshold current, spectral behavior, I-V-curves, tuning range, and bandwidth were measured for the original diode laser and then compared to the measurements in an external cavity with and without antireflection (AR) coatings. The tuning range approximately doubled after AR coating. The modal stability was found to be better by a factor of 7 in the external cavity. The power amplification through the external cavity was as high as 50. It was also attempted to process laser diodes from material fabricated at OSU, however the resulting diodes showed a high series resistance and were not usable for this project. Additional work needs to be done in this area. The result of this work is a stable external cavity diode laser tunable over an 18 nm bandwidth which can be used as a tunable source in many applications. / Graduation date: 1995

The purpose of this thesis is to study the c-axis inclined ZnO films to produce dual-mode thin-film piezoelectric transducer. The cantilever beam vibration theory as a power generation mode in adopted to verify that the transducer is in suitable for the application in the environment for low-frequency vibration. In order to develop dual-mode thin-film piezoelectric transducer, this study uses radio-frequency magnetron sputtering method with off-axis growth to deposit ZnO films on Pt/Ti/stainless steel substrate(SUS304), the effects of deposition parameters on the characteristict of ZnO films are studied. Because zinc oxide thin-film is grown with c-axis tilt, so the piezoelectric transducer exhibits longitudinal-mode and shear-mode characteristics. The physical characteristics of ZnO thin films were obtained by the analyses of the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) to discuss the surfaces, cross section and crystallization of ZnO thin films. Finally, the vibration test equipment in used for the measurement of electrical properties. The open and loaded voltages of the transducers were obtained by the measurement system. The optimal deposition parameters for ZnO thin films are sputtering pressure of 5 mTorr, RF power of 150W, substrate temperature of room temperature and oxygen concentration of 50%, which were determined by physical characteristics and voltage analysis. Under the optimal parameters, the ZnO thin-films are deposited with maximum shear-mode and tilting angles of 35¢X.The transducer was one-sid loaded with a piece of metal of 0.5 g load to enhance the cantilever vibration amplitude. As the input vibration of 65 Hz and vibration amplitude of 1mm were set, the maximum output power was obtained. The maximum open circuit voltage of 19.4 V was obtained. When the output of the transducers was recetified and filtered through a 1NN5711 Schottky diode bridge rectifier and a 33nF capacitor, the maximum power of 2.05£gW/cm2 was achieved with the load resistance of 5M£[.

High dielectric constant barium doped titanium silicon oxide films with equivalent oxide thickness below 1 nm can be prepared by liquid phase deposition. We learn from this research that the deposition rate of titanium silicon oxide films can be much enhanced by nitric acid incorporation, and the dielectric constant of materials can be increased by the dipole polarization from barium. The key parameter for the deposition rate, refractive index, and the dielectric constant of barium doped titanium silicon oxide is the molarity of barium nitrate. The electrical properties can be improved effectively by thermal annealing treatments. The optimum equivalent oxide thickness of barium doped titanium silicon oxide thin film is 0.9 nm with the optical thickness of 7.4 nm. The high dielectric constant can reach 31.9 and the leakage current density is 5 ¡Ñ 10-6 A/cm2 at the electrical field intensity of 5 MV/cm, which has high potential application for the next generation MOSFET.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 147-155). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 1990.

Thesis (M.App.Sc.) - Carleton University, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 82-92). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.