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A capacitance-to-digital converter with sinusoidal excitation suitable for series RC sensors
Prashanth Vooka,
Published in IEEE Computer Society
2014
Volume: 2014-January
   
Pages: 367 - 371
Abstract
A new Capacitance-to-Digital Converter (CDC) applicable for series RC sensors that requires/prefers sinusoidal excitation is proposed in this paper. The CDC presented works based on a dual-slope technique and it gives a digital output as a function of unknown capacitance of a series RC sensor, i.e., a capacitive sensor with a capacitor and a resistor in series in its electrical equivalent circuit. Output of the CDC is not sensitive to the series resistor. The CDC is useful for grounded as well as floating capacitive sensors, which needs to be excited with a sine wave for best performance. Applications of such capacitive sensors include ice detection, sterility testing of packed food products, etc. A sinusoidal Howland current source can be used to excite a grounded capacitive sensor while a simple current source with a special stabilization scheme that suppresses the effect due to static errors of opamp has been developed for floating capacitive sensor and presented in this paper. A prototype of the proposed CDC for a floating capacitive sensor has been built and tested in the laboratory. Measurement results for the sensor capacitance showed a worst case error of 0.13% for a range of 100 pF, proving the efficacy of the proposed scheme.
About the journal
JournalData powered by TypesetProceedings of the International Conference on Sensing Technology, ICST
PublisherData powered by TypesetIEEE Computer Society
ISSN21568065
Open AccessNo
Concepts (16)
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    Capacitance
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    Electric grounding
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    Equivalent circuits
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    Food products
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    Frequency converters
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    Operational amplifiers
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    Resistors
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    CAPACITANCE-TO-DIGITAL CONVERTER
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    Current sources
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    DUAL-SLOPE TECHNIQUE
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    Electrical equivalent circuit
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    SENSOR CAPACITANCE
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    Sinusoidal excitations
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    STERILITY TESTING
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    WORST CASE ERROR
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    CAPACITIVE SENSORS