Category Archives: Newsworthy

How Black can VantaBlack be?

Any student of Physics knows that black surfaces are good absorbers of radiation of the visible and the infrared spectrum of light—they readily soak in visible light and heat rays. That is the reason they look black, as they reflect very little light. In fact, the amount of light reflected by a black surface is a measure of its blackness. Therefore, when VantaBlack, from the UK-based Surrey NanoSystems, is called blacker than black, there is a specific reason—it reflects only 0.04% of the light falling on it, including visible, UV, and IR radiations.

This property of VantaBlack gives it excellent characteristics. It offers high front-to-back thermal conduction along with high thermal shock resistance. As VantaBlack is also super-hydrophobic, it rejects water accumulation, the material design is perfect for applications varying from thermal camouflage to space exploration.

Vanta is an acronym for Vertically Aligned Carbon NanoTube Arrays. Billions of such tubes are grown on a substrate using a modified process of chemical vapor deposition. Each square centimeter of the substrate can hold more than a billion such tubes, each about 20 nm in diameter and from 5 to 14 µm long.

This packed forest of carbon nanotubes effectively traps incoming light. Individual photons bounce between the microscopic spaces separating each tube, and eventually dissipate as heat. There is very little particle fallout or outgassing as the material is a high thermal conductor. The heat passes on to the substrate, which has low thermal tolerances.

Surrey NanoSystems have developed three versions of VantaBlack—they vary on their capabilities of light absorption, heat abstinence, and application processes. The first version has already been described above. The second is known as S-VIS and it is unique as it can be sprayed on to a material (but not with a spray can), rather than deposited by vapor deposition. That means S-VIS can be directly applied to any surface material.

As S-VIS is sprayed on, the nanotubes cannot remain aligned. They are rather scattered, with the result that the light-absorbing properties of S-VIS are diminished, reflecting about 0.23% of the visible spectrum. Additionally, the user has to bake the material after spraying it, which limits the type of substrate he or she can use. However, S-VIS is perfect for any complex-shaped or 3-D object or for any applications where there is no flat surface.

VantaBlack’s third version is known simply is 2.0, and the company claims it to be even darker than the first version. It is so black that Surrey has not been able to measure the light reflected from 2.0 with their MID-IR or UV-VIS spectrometers. There is very little information on 2.0 from the company, but they have demonstrated in a video that 2.0 can absorb laser light.

There are innumerable uses for VantaBlack. Primarily, most uses are in the optical field, which benefit from the light-absorbing and low outgassing features of the material. For instance, pairing VantaBlack with a precision IR imaging platform such as FLIR can result in a high-resolution system able to differentiate between heat sources. When used in Earth-based telescopes, VantaBlack can reduce the atmospheric distortion and prevent practically all stray light reflection from the polished lenses.

Accurate Methods of Gas Analysis

The earliest methods of detecting poisonous gases involved using birds such as canaries. This was mainly inside mines, where the presence of carbon monoxide, methane, and carbon dioxide had a harmful effect on the miners. The canaries, being sensitive to life threatening gases, would stop singing in the presence of such gases. This was a signal for the miners to evacuate.

Modern methods use several other means of detection, and are more accurate. These involve detecting gases accurately and analyzing them in different areas. For instance, households have carbon monoxide detectors to alert families of the presence of dangerous gases. Explosive detection in airports uses gas chromatography, while human breath analysis forms one of the diagnostic tools for patients in hospitals.

Most gases are frequently undetectable, unless they possess a peculiar odor. That makes the ability to analyze the composition of gases so crucial to human health and safety. By knowing the composition of the gases, we get a clue as to the operation of different processes operating and improving upon them. At present, there exist technologies for several optical, laser, and spectroscopic gas analysis. The major processes involve laser absorption spectroscopy, photoionization, and paramagnetism, involving different types of electronic components.

Laser Absorption Spectroscopy

Laser absorption spectroscopy is the operating principle behind several technologies involving gas analysis. The basic principle being different molecules absorb specific light waves, and the amount of energy a gas absorbs gives an indication of its composition. The characteristic absorption spectra offer very accurate gas detection and analysis. One of the laser-based instruments used is the Tunable Diode Laser Spectrometer (TDLS).

Tunable Diode Laser Spectrometer

With TDLS, it is possible to measure low concentrations of gases such as carbon dioxide, ammonia, water vapor, or methane. Within the instrument, a photodiode measures the reduction in signal intensity when the emission wavelength of the laser is adjusted to match the absorption lines of the target molecule. The measurement readings give an estimation of the concentration of the target gas.

For proper operation of the TDLS, it is important to select a suitable absorption line for the compound under study. This makes TDLS highly specific and sensitive. The ability of TDLS to measure several points simultaneously and its non-intrusive nature has been of great help in combustion diagnostics.

IR Spectroscopy

A similar technology involves infrared (IR) spectroscopy. By measuring the absorption of a light source through the gas sample, IR spectroscopy helps to analyze the gas composition. This technology focuses on the IR wavelengths that excite the molecules of the gas. Detection involves use of Fourier Transform Infrared Technology (FTIR). In actual use, a combination of light frequencies is directed towards a sample and the detectors within the instrument measure the light the gas absorbs. After repeating this process several times with different combination of light frequencies, a computer processes the raw absorption data and converts the result using a Fourier Transform algorithm. IR spectroscopy can measure more than 20 different gases simultaneously, and is very suitable for measuring carbon dioxide and organic compounds.

Ammonia Sensors

These very sensitive devices use IR spectroscopy for detecting ambient levels of atmospheric ammonia in the environment.

Two Raspberry Pi HAT Controller Modules

Atomo Systems, from Hong Kong, will be producing the Atomo Modular Electronic System for building electronic projects with four parts—Control, IO, Power, and Connector. The system also includes two low-cost HAT modules with onboard ARM MCUs compatible to the Raspberry Pi (RBPi). The combined controller connector board uses a small and inexpensive MCU, similar to what an Arduino Uno uses. However, the ARM MCU is faster, has more IO, and is better compatible with the RBPi.

The idea behind building such a modular system is to allow the user to focus more on the project rather than worrying about running extra wires for power or adding more IO. The system is highly flexible and has ample system resources. For instance, if you need to solve larger problems, you can simply add more resources such as by swapping controllers rather than starting all over again.

Any electronic project needs Inputs and outputs to connect to the rest of the world. The modular electronic system comes with IO modules with a useful amount of IO. In addition to offering adequate power for most applications, you can double up the modules using the 8-module connector board.

The onboard connectors on the extended controllers offer features such as multi-channel clock generation and bus multiplexing. Therefore, you can easily keep track of the system temperature using the built-in thermistor, and drive a fan if the temperature exceeds a certain limit.

The modular electronic system needs power to work. Apart from deriving power from the USB socket, other options are also available, from 13 W to 2 kW. These include a 5.5 mm DC Barrel Plug, ATX, and POE. Voltages on tap include 12 VDC, 5 VDC, and 3.3 VDC. For driving higher power devices such as heaters and motors, the input voltage may be used directly.

All the controllers are compatible to the 40-pin HAT connector on the RBPi. They contain EEPROMs for the RBPi HAT to allow for system configuration and automatic device driver setup. Separate SPI and I2C interfaces allow addressing two PWMs, two ADCs, and four GPIOs. The MKE02Z16VLD4 MCU by NXP powers both. This is a 44-pin LQFP, 5 V tolerant, and ESD robust ARM Cortex m0+ CPU running at 40 MHz. One of the controllers is a low power module, while the other is a high power module capable of handling up to 600 W of power usage, via a 34-pin power module connector.

Compatibility with the HAT connector on the RBPi allows programming on the RBPi for updating the controllers. Additionally, you can simply use the Atomo as a modular HAT. This way, you can handle ROS robots or any other system where the RBPi is solely used for interfacing and processing, while the Atomo HAT provides the additional power, IO, or real time control the project requires.

The low power RBPi HAT combined controller and Connector boards make two IO module systems. Therefore, you can build POE powered RBPi applications for a simple RBPi powered robot. This board features 2×28-pin IO modules powered by the RBPi itself. The higher power version has a standard 34-pin power module.

Graphene Cells Generate Energy for Prosthetic Hands

At the Glasgow University, Scotland, a team of scientists has discovered a new use for graphene cells —the honeycomb form of carbon. They are using it to develop prosthetic limbs or more specifically, robotic arms with a sense of touch built-in.

The world over, several researchers and their teams are trying to make synthetic skin, which is flexible, and at the same time, has a sense of touch similar to the various types of sensory receptors the human skin possesses. At the Glasgow University, the scientists are powering an experimental form of electronic skin. They are using the power produced by solar cells made of graphene.

Although many types of prosthetic hands are available that can reproduce several mechanical functions of human limbs, the sense of touch is one not included yet. It would benefit the amputees a lot, if they could use a prosthetic hand that could sense what it touched, as this would be much closer to a real hand.

Such prosthetic systems do need clean electric energy, but providing that is hardly an easy task. However, the team of researchers from the School of Engineering at the University of Glasgow has discovered that by using ultra-thin honeycomb of carbon, also called graphene, they can generate the necessary clean power derived from the Sun.

Incorporating these clean energy generators in electronic skin with the sense of touch means robots can enhance their ability and performance when interacting with humans and detect potential dangers in a better way.

The team, led by Ravinder Bahiya, describes the process of integrating such photovoltaic cells made of graphene into the electronic skin, in detail, in the journal Advanced Functional Material.

Now the team is planning to use the same technology for powering other motors driving the prosthetic hand. According to the team, this is the only way they will be creating a prosthetic limb that is completely autonomous in its energy generation—something close to the normal limb.

Graphene Cells / Graphene Solar Cells

Graphene is actually a single layer of carbon atoms bonded together in a repeating pattern of hexagons. This structure makes it a two-dimensional material with amazing characteristics—a wonder material with extreme strength, flexibility, transparency, and astonishing conductivity. As it is made from carbon, a material abundantly available on the earth, graphene has the endless potential to improve existing products, while inspiring new ones.

Graphene’s superb transparency and conductivity make it an excellent choice for solar cells. However, although a great conductor in itself, graphene is not good at collecting the electrical current produced within the solar cell. While looking at alternative ways of modifying graphene for the purpose, scientists found graphene oxide (GO) to be more suitable for solar cells. Graphene oxide, although less conductive than graphene, is more transparent and a better charge collector.

Most organic cells generally use conductive indium tin oxide (ITO) and a non-conductive glass layer as their transparent electrodes. However, ITO is a brittle and rare substance that makes solar panels expensive. On the other hand, graphene as a replacement for ITO makes cheaper electrodes for photovoltaic cells.

Five New Advancements in Solar Cells

The earth receives a huge amount of sunlight every hour. Converted to electricity, this would amount to 52 PW/hr. This is more than ten times the entire amount of electricity produced per hour by China in 2013. In the same year, top countries of the world together produced only 16 PW/hr. of electricity. As this is much less than the actual potential of generation of electricity from the solar energy falling on the planet earth, several countries are actively engaged on research and development on photovoltaic cells.

There have been several breakthroughs in photovoltaic cell technology. For instance, early cells were very expensive and inefficient—almost $1800/watt and 4% respectively. Costs have now come down to $0.75/watt, while the efficiency has increased to 40%. Since, then, there have been several other breakthroughs in the solar cell domain.

Printable Solar Cells

At the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), researchers have developed a printable solar cell, and they can print or paint this on a surface. According to the lead researcher Dr. Mitra, they are aiming for printable sheets of solar cells that any home-based inkjet printer will be able to print and place on the wall, roof, or billboard to generate power. The printable cells are made of carbon nanotubes 50,000 times smaller than a human hair.

All-Carbon Flexible Solar Cells

Scientists at the Stanford University have made these flexible solar cells from a special form of carbon called graphene. According to Zhenan Bao, one of the team and a professor of chemical engineering at Stanford, the flexible carbon solar cells can be coated on to the surface of cars, windows, or buildings for generating electricity.
By replacing expensive materials when manufacturing conventional solar cells, the all-carbon solar cell is expected to make the cells much cheaper.

Transparent Solar Cells

At the Michigan State University, a team of researchers has made solar cells that appear transparent to the visible spectrum of sunlight. Rather, these non-intrusive solar cells convert light beyond the visible spectrum to electricity. Therefore, these can be used on smartphones, on windowpanes of buildings, or in windshields of vehicles without impeding their performance.

According to MSU assistant professor Richard Lunt, their aim is to produce solar harvesting surfaces that are invisible. However, the present efficiency of these cells is a mere 1%, as they are in their initial stages.

Wearable Ultra-Thin Solar Cells

In South Korea, at the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology, scientists have used gallium arsenide to develop solar cells with a thickness of just one micrometer, more than 100 times thinner than human hair. According to Jongho Lee, an engineer at the institute, such thin cells can be integrated into fabric or glass frames to power the next wave of wearable electronics.

To create such thin cells, the scientists removed extra adhesives from the traditional cells, and cold-welded them on flexible substrates at 170°C.

Solar Cells with 100% Efficiency

By extracting all the energy from excitons, researchers at the University of Cambridge have found methods of making solar cells that are more efficient. Such a hybrid cell combines organic material and inorganic material into high conversion efficiency.

SALTO the Agile Jumping Robot

In the Biomimetic Millisystems Lab at UC Berkeley, Duncan Haldane is responsible for numerous bite-sized bio-inspired robots—robots with hairs, robots with tails, robots with wings, and running robots. Haldane and the other members of the lab look at the most talented and capable animals for inspiration for their robotic designs.

The African Galago or Bushbaby is one such animal. It is a fluffy, cute, talented, and capable little jumping animal weighing only a few kilos. However, this little creature can jump over and clear bushes nearly two meters tall in a single bound. Biologists have discovered that Galagos’ legs are specially structured to amplify the power of their tendons and muscles. Haldane and his team accordingly made Salto, a legged robot weighing only a hundred grams, endowing it with agility and the most impressive jumping skills. Salto features in a paper the new journal Science Robotics.

Jumping is not only about how high one can jump, how frequently you can jump also matters. Haldane and his team have coined the term agility to refer to how far upwards one can go while jumping repeatedly. Technically, they define it as the maximum average vertical velocity achieved while performing repeated jumps. For a Galago, it can jump 1.7 m in height repeatedly every 0.78 s—an agility of 2.2 m/s.

Therefore, to be called agile, the jumper not only has to jump high, he also has to be able to jump frequently. For instance, although EPFL’s Jumper can jump to impressive heights of 1.3 m, it can only do so every four seconds. That means its agility is a measly 0.325 m/s. On the other hand, Minitaur can jump up only to 0.48 m, but it does so every 0.43 s, which gives it a much better agility of 1.1 m/s, despite its lower jumping ability.

That means improving agility involves jumping either higher, or more frequently, or both. Galagos are agile, because of not only their ability to jump high, but also their ability to do so repeatedly. Most jumping robots have low agility, because, they need to spend time winding a spring for storing up enough energy to jump again, and this reduces their jump frequency. The researchers at Berkeley wanted a robot with an agility matching that of the Galagos. With Salto, they have come close, as Salto can jump 1 m every 0.58 seconds, earning an agility of 1.7 m/s.

Just as with many jumping robots, Salto also uses an elastic element, such as a spring, for the starting point. For Salto, the spring, actually a piece of twistable rubber is placed in series between a motor and the environment, making a Series Elastic Actuator (SEA). Apart from protecting the motor, SEAs also allow for force control and power modulation, while allowing the robot to recover some energy passively.

Such springs are available to the Galagos in the form of their tendons and muscles. However, the leg of the Galagos is in such a form that allows it to output nearly 15 times more force than its muscles can by themselves. Haldane has used this same design for Salto as well.

Connect with a New Type of Li-Fi

Many of us are stuck with slow Wi-Fi, and eagerly waiting for light-based communications to be commercialized, as Li-Fi promises to be more than 100 times faster than the Wi-Fi connections we use today.

As advertised so far, most Li-Fi systems depend on the LED bulb to transmit data using visible light. However, this implies limitations on the technology being applied to systems working outside the lab. Therefore, researchers are now using a different type of Li-Fi using infrared light instead. In early testing, this new technology has already crossed speeds of 40 gigabits per second.

According to the Li-Fi technology, a communication system first invented in 2011, data is transmitted via high-speed flickering of the LED light. The flickering is fast enough to be imperceptible to the human eye. Although lab-based speeds of Li-Fi have reached 224 gbps, real-world testing reached only 1 gbps. As this is still higher than the Wi-Fi speeds achievable today, people were excited about getting Li-Fi in their homes and offices—after all, you need only an LED bulb. However, there are certain limitations with this scheme.

LED based Li-Fi presumes the bulb is always turned on for the technology to work—it will not work in the dark. Therefore, you cannot browse while in bed in the dark. Moreover, as in regular Wi-Fi, there is only one LED bulb to distribute the signal to different devices, implying the system will slow down as more devices connect to the LED bulb.

Joanne Oh, a PhD student from the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands, wants to fix these issues with the Li-Fi concept. The researcher proposes to use infrared light instead of the visible light from an LED bulb.

Using infrared light for communication is not new, but has not been very popular or commercialized because of the need for energy-intensive movable mirrors required to beam the infrared light. On the other hand, Oh proposes a simple passive antenna that uses no moving parts to send and receive data.
Rob Lefebvre, from Engadget, explains the new concept as requiring very little power, since there are no moving parts. According to Rob, the new concept may not be only marginally speedier than the current Wi-Fi setups, while providing interference-free connections, as envisaged.

For instance, experiments using the system in the Eindhoven University have already reached download speeds of over 42 gbps over distances of 2.5 meters. Compare this with the average connection speed most people see from their Wi-Fi, approximately 17.5 mbps, and the maximum the best Wi-Fi systems can deliver, around 300 mbps. These figures are around 2000 times and 100 times slower respectively.

The new Li-Fi system feeds rays of infrared light through an optical fiber to several light antennae mounted on the ceiling, which beam the wireless data downwards through gratings. This radiates the light rays in different direction depending on their wavelengths and angles. Therefore, no power or maintenance is necessary.

As each device connecting to the system gets its own ray of light to transfer data at a slightly different wavelength, the connection does not slow down, no matter how many computers or smartphones are connected to it simultaneously.

How Do Wind Turbines Work?

Wind turbines generate electricity from moving winds. You can see them in large numbers on wind farms both onshore and offshore. The blowing wind turns their blades, and rotates the shaft on which the blades are mounted. The shaft in turn, operates an electric generator and the resulting electric output is sometimes stored in a battery. A swarm of wind turbines can generate a substantial amount of energy. Wind turbines are often called a renewable source of energy, as they generate power from natural renewable sources, and do not consume fossil fuel, a source that cannot be replenished.

Inside the wind turbine, there are several control systems at work. These include its ability to turn the face of the turbine into the wind, called yawing, and its ability to control the angle of its blades, called pitch. Yawing and pitch extract the maximum amount of power from the blades rotating in the wind and require motors and controls. However, the yawing of a wind tower may actually twist the cables inside. The wind turbine usually has electronic intelligence built inside to untwist the cables.

The wind actually propels the blades, which are designed using the laws of physics and vectors to extract the maximum from the wind driving them. Speed analysis shows the maximum efficiency the wind turbine can achieve is about 59%. The laws of physics, especially Betz’s limit prevents the wind turbine from achieving efficiencies any higher.

As mentioned earlier, the main parts of a wind turbine are the blades mounted on a shaft. As the blades turn with the wind, the shaft rotates and spins a generator to make electricity. Most designs of wind turbines use electronic controls to generate the 60 Hz AC sine wave, although there are wind turbines that generate DC as well.

Typically, a doubly-fed induction generator is used to generate three-phase power. As this requires capacitors and a DC link, workers need to monitor the systems periodically to prevent failure of capacitors. Most of the control is similar to that used for controlling bidirectional motors, using IGBTs, and rectifier diodes in a full bridge arrangement. These components are rather large, considering the voltage generated is nearly 690 volts, and the power is in megawatts. Transformers step up the voltage from the generator to the grid power line, and there is built-in protection to limit the spikes as the speed of the wind increases.

The rotation speeds for wind turbine blades are 5-20 rpm, while a generator needs to rotate at speeds between 750 and 3600 rpm to generate power. Therefore, a gearbox in between translates the speeds. When maintenance time comes around, a combination of yawing and proper pitch is used to stop the rotation. Workers then insert pins into the shaft, locking the blades to prevent them from spinning.

Workers servicing and maintaining the blades have to dangle from ropes hundreds of feet above the ground in the air. Other parts, being within the tower, can be maintained more easily. In general, the maintenance and servicing for a wind turbine is similar to that required by any other turbine in a power generating station.

Treat Yourself to a Raspberry Pi Zero W

The launch of the Raspberry Pi Zero W (RBPiZW) by the Raspberry Pi Foundation recently has added two features many fans of the RBPi have been requesting for a long time. The two features, built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, added to the wonderful RBPi Zero have improved the functionality of the tiny single board computer.

After all, the RBPiZW is only a variant of the RBPi Zero, and therefore, does not merit a full length, in depth review. However, we will focus on the new features the RBPiZW brings to the users.

Keeping with the tradition of the RBPi family of SBC, there is no case or anything to enable the user to treat the RBPiZW as a commercial product. Just like the other RBPi products before it, the RBPiZW is a complete single board computer, bare bones, versatile, and cheap. The Foundation has created the board this way so all hobbyists and professionals can use it with equal ease to make anything they want.

As with the original RBPi Zero, the RBPiZW also has its System-on-a-Chip (SoC) near the middle of the board, while the bottom of the board has the various mini and micro ports. For instance, rather than a full sized HDMI port, the board has a mini-HDMI port for the display to be connected. At the bottom, you will also find two micro-USB ports. One is used for supplying power to the board, and the other to carry data in and out. Therefore, if you wish to connect peripherals such as a mouse or a keyboard, you will need to use a micro-USB B male to USB A female adapter.

On the left side of the board, you will find the micro-SD slot. As with the other RBPi boards of the family, the RBPiZW also does not have built-in flash memory. Therefore, for the Operating System and data storage, you must use a micro-SD card else, you will not be able to boot the tiny computer.

Although there is an Ethernet port on the RBPiZW to connect to the Internet via an Ethernet cable, the presence of the on-board Wi-Fi precludes the use of a USB Wi-Fi dongle. That means even if you do not have a ready Ethernet cable, the RBPiZW will not face any difficulty in surfing the net.

To enable to RBPiZW to start running, you will need to supply it power from its power supply through the micro-USB cable. You must also have a micro-SD card of at least 8 GB capacity and the relevant OS stored on it. If you are going to connect a monitor to the RBPiZW, you will also need a mini-HDMI to HDMI adapter, and an HDMI cable. As you have used up one USB port for power, there is only one more micro-USB port available. Therefore, to connect a keyboard and mouse, you will additionally need a small USB hub. Of course, if you have a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard, the single micro-USB port is enough, and you can dispense with the USB hub altogether. For headless applications, you can also discard the monitor, and the HDMI connectors/cables.

Sensing Movement in Three Axes

All modern vehicles must sense the position and movement of automotive control functions such as turn signal indicators and gear selectors. However, engineers face challenges here with conventional sensor technologies as the requirement is for sensing movement in the three axes simultaneously. The challenge lies in the physical size of the device, its reliability, power consumption, and its cost. However, 3-D magnetic sensing technology, recently introduced, could be helping engineers to address these challenges.

It is well known that electro-mechanical switching is a common source of failures in the several applications, including in automobiles. Contacts usually corrode or burn out over a period, causing inconveniences and failure to the owner of the vehicle, also potentially damaging the reputation of the manufacturer of the car. Therefore, most car manufacturers prefer using solid-state technology, such as switching based on Hall-Effect detection of magnetic signals. This method increases the reliability, saves space, and is inexpensive.

When driving a car, among the most common things people do is to signal for a turn and change gears. In the past, most cars used heavy current wiring harnesses around the vehicle for transmitting signals and power. Lately, using a turn indicator or a gearshift is more likely to send a high-impedance signal to a central processing unit rather than physically switching something over.

Vehicular control is becoming more sophisticated and multi-functional, with the trend moving towards sensing in more than one plane. For instance, most modern cars using automatic gearboxes now have sequential controls and move the gear lever into a different plane. That makes the task of sensing position more complex than ever.

Magnetic 3-D Sensing

Hall Effect sensing for implementing 3-D position sensing is actually possible in several ways. One can place individual Hall sensors at the multiple fixed positions where the movement has to be sensed—just as in the case of a turn signal or a gear lever. This may result in as many as seven sensor elements, and the controller will know the position by locating the live sensor.

Another method could be to use flux concentrators. Although this method also uses Hall sensors, the number of sensors used is lower. This is because two pairs of orthogonal sensing elements are integrated into a CMOS IC, whose surface has a deposit of a ferromagnetic film to enhance the magnetic field, increase the sensitivity, and increase the signal-to-noise ratio.

Several algorithms in subtraction and addition make it possible to accurately sense the magnetic field components present in the horizontal (X and Y) and the vertical (Z) directions to the IC. Analog to digital converters then convert these analog voltages from the sensors to digital values and the digital signal processors then compute the final, absolute position.

However, none of the above is a viable solution in the automotive sector, as these are not suitable for mass production, because multiple sensors are involved. However, there is another alternative, also based on Hall-Effect sensors—the TLE493D-A1B6 3-D sensor. This simultaneously determines the x, y, and z coordinates of the magnetic source, while building a 3-D image of the magnetic field that surrounds the sensor.