Gas detection with microelectromechanical Fabry-Perot

interferometer technology in cell phone

Rami Mannila1, Risto Hyypi1, Marko Korkalainen1, Martti Blomberg2, Hannu Kattelus2, Anna
Rissanen1
1
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Espoo, Finland
2
VTT Memsfab, Espoo, Finland

ABSTRACT
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland has developed a miniaturized optical sensor for gas detection in a cell phone.
The sensor is based on a microelectromechanical (MEMS) Fabry-Perot interferometer, which is a structure with two
highly reflective surfaces separated by a tunable air gap. The MEMS FPI is a monolithic device, i.e. it is made entirely
on one substrate in a batch process, without assembling separate pieces together. The gap is adjusted by moving the
upper mirror with electrostatic force, so there are no actual moving parts.
VTT has designed and manufactured a MEMS FPI based carbon dioxide sensor demonstrator which is integrated to a
cell phone shield cover. The demonstrator contains light source, gas cell, MEMS FPI, detector, control electronics and
two coin cell batteries as a power source. It is connected to the cell phone by Bluetooth. By adjusting the wavelength
range and customizing the MEMS FPI structure, it is possible to selectively sense multiple gases.
Keywords: Fabry-Perot Interferometer, MEMS, carbon dioxide, gas measurement, handheld device, cell phone,
spectroscopy

1. INTRODUCTION
VTT Technical Research Center of Finland developed a microelectromechanical (MEMS) Fabry-Perot Interferometer
(FPI) for infrared wavelength region in the 90s1. Developed component was applied in carbon dioxide (CO2) sensor and
is still used in Carbocap, which is product of Vaisala Oyj. Same technology was applied also for water vapor and
ethylene measurements in the ESA funded research project2. VTT has also recently demonstrated MEMS FPIs for
hydrocarbon gas measurement in range 3-3.7 m3 as well as multigas measurements in thermal IR (7.5 9.5 m)4. The
developed MEMS FPI platforms can further be customized for various wavelength applications within NIR LWIR.
MEMS FPI technology enables small size and low power consumption which are essential in gas detection with a cell
phone. CO2 was selected to be the first gas to demonstrate gas detection in the cell phone.
Carbon dioxide has strong absorptions in the wavelength range 4200-4400 nm. CO2 transmission spectrum is presented
in Figure 1. There is not any overlapping gas absorption spectra from other gases, thus concentration can be analyzed by
measuring signal with two wavelengths, on absorption band and reference band. Reference band could be selected in the
range 4000-4200 nm, in order to have similar sensitivity of sensor and light source intensity as on absorption band.
According Beer-Lambert law spectral transmission of gas is 5

(1)

where  is wavelength,  is absorption coefficient, c is a gas concentration and L is an optical path length. Because CO2
absorption is strong and typical concentrations in outdoor and indoor conditions are 400-1000ppm the path length can be
relative short.

*rami.mannila@vtt.fi; www.vtt.fi
1H[W*HQHUDWLRQ6SHFWURVFRSLF7HFKQRORJLHV9,,,HGLWHGE\0DUN$'UX\
5LFKDUG$&URFRPEH'DYLG3%DQQRQ3URFRI63,(9RO3
63,(&&&FRGH;GRL
3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

Gas analyzing with differeent spectroscoopic technologgies are presented6,7. Carboon dioxide is ooften measureed with NDIR
R
technology which
w
is typicaally based on two
t filters andd two separate detectors off filter wheel aand a single detector.
d
Thesee
filters are fixeed to absorption band and reference
r
bandd6. Separate fiilters and deteectors has indiividual drift due to differennt
temperature and
a contaminaation. The ME
EMS FPI techhnology advan
ntages comparred to NDIR aare that only one
o detector iss
needed and light path is similar for abssorption and reference
r
band and there are
a no movingg parts, thus sensor
s
is moree
stable and robbust.

Figure 1. Trannsmission of 3330ppm CO2 in 100

1 mm opticall path. This dataa is from HITR
RAN database7.

2. FA
ABRY-PER
ROT INTE
ERFEROMETER
The tunable FPI
F is a pass-bband filter, coonsisting of tw
wo parallel Braagg reflector mirrors,
m
consiisting of quartter wavelengthh
(/4) dielectrric layers withh alternating high
h
and low
w refractive in
ndex material and separatedd by an adjusstable air gapp.
Multiple refleections betweeen the mirrorrs result a connstructive interrference in thhe transmitted signal in a naarrow spectraal
band, which is the transm
mission peak, defined by its full widtth at half-maaximum (FWH
HM). The firrst-order peakk
wavelength iss nearly two tiimes the gap optical
o
thickneess, thus the name
n
/2 gap.
The MEMS FPI
F is processed on a low--conductivity Si substrate which
w
is transsparent (near--zero loss) ov
ver the mid-IR
R
spectral rangge. The surfacce-micromachhined manufaccturing processs flow is based on LPCV
VD (low pressure chemicaal
vapor depositted thin films, patterned wiith 15 layout exposures (Figure 2) and vaarious etch prrocesses. The mirrors are 3layer stacks of
o /4-layers of
o poly-Si / SiO
S 2 / poly-Si. The lower mirror
m
is fixedd on the substtrate with an anti-reflectionn
SiO2 film bellow the Braggg reflector. Thhe upper mirroor is released by
b means of sacrificial
s
SiO
O2 etching to be deflected byy
the electrostaatic actuation. On the substtrate back side, a patterned
d Al-metal layyer defines thee 0.8-mm-diaameter circularr
aperture of thhe device. Thee Si-air-interfaace reflection at the back su
urface is limiteed by another anti-reflection
n coating. Thee
MEMS chip footprint is 2.5
2 mm x 2.5 mm. The subbstrate is 680
0 m thick annd all the thinn films add up
p to ca. 8 m
m
thickness.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

The actuatingg electrodes arre integrated within

w
the miirror membran
nes by patternned and ion-im
mplanted poly
ysilicon layerss
The pull-in phenomenon
p
l
limits
the actuuation range to
t one third of the air gap and the desiggn wavelength
h of the Braggg
reflector mirrrors limits the tuning range through the reflectance deg
gradation and widening of tthe transmissiion peak whenn
moving too far
f from the optimization
o
w
wavelength.
F
Further
apart from the opeerational rangee, the Bragg reflector bandd
ultimately dettermines the limits
l
of the FPI stop band.
More detailedd description of
o the MEMS FPI structuree and tuning caan be found inn an article wrritten by Blom
mberg et al1.

Figure 2. Struccture of the ME

EMS Fabry-Peroot Interferometeer. A: Contact pads
p
; B: Actuattion electrode ; C: Upper movable mirror ; D:
Lower fixed mirror ; E: Opttical aperture.

3 CELL PHONE
3.
P
GA
AS SENSOR
3.1 Overview
w
The cell phonne gas sensorr was developped based on the
t use of ME
EMS FPI. Taarget was to ddemonstrate po
otential of thee
MEMS FPI technology
t
in general in terrms of integraation of gas sensors withinn cell phones aand CO2 was selected for a
target gas beccause it has sttrong absorptiion and in CO
O2 absorption range
r
there arre no interferinng gas absorp
ptions. The gass
sensor was decided
d
to integrate in to an external shield cover of the cell phone.
p
LG N
Nexus 5 was selected
s
for a
demonstratorr phone. The gas
g sensor is connected
c
to a cell phone via Bluetooth
Smart and poower source of
o the sensor iss
two coin cell batteries.

3.2 Optics
Optical structture of the deemonstrator device is simillar what it waas in a hydroccarbon gas sennsor, which was
w developedd
earlier3. Struccture is presennted in Figure 3. Target wass to develop a very small gas sensor, thuus absorption length
l
was seet
to 23.5 mm. Absorption
A
length influencees to sensitiviity and dynam
mic range of thhe gas sensor. Sensitivity would
w
be betterr
with longer path
p
length beecause concenntration changge would hav
ve higher influuence for gass transmission
n (equation 1)).
However, shoorter path lenggth enables deetection of higgher concentraations, becausee transmissionn does not satu
urate such low
w
concentrationns.
Optics compoonents are IR--emitter, sappphire lens, longpass filter, MEMS
M
FPI annd PbSe-detecctor. The IR-emitter is Intexx
065-0300, whhich was seleccted because it
i has small heeated membraane area (0.65 x 0.85 mm2) which makess possible highh
modulation frrequency (50%
% at 40 Hz) and
a low powerr consumption
n. In this opticcal structure thhe heated mem
mbrane area iss

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

adequate. The modulation frequency enables fast measurement time. Typically IR-emitters have larger membrane area
which leads to slower modulation frequency and higher optical output power. Small heated membrane area also means
small power consumption (200 mW) which enables to using coin cell batteries as a power source.
The wavelength range of this demonstrator is 4-4.3m, thus typical glass materials (e.g. BK7) cannot be used. Therefore
selected lens is made of sapphire which is transparent in used wavelength range. The sapphire lens is a half ball lens with
radius of the 6.175 mm.
The MEMS FPI is clued and wire-bonded to a small printed circuit board which has 2.0 mm hole in the location of
optical axis. An aperture size of the MEMS FPI is 0.8 mm.
The longpass filter has transmission in range 3.6 - 7.2 m. The measurement range in this application is 4.0 4.3 m. A
short pass filter is not needed because the PbSe-detector is not sensitive if wavelength is more than 4.5 m. Selected
PbSe-detector (Hamamatsu P9696-02) has an active area of 2 x 2 mm2.

Figure 3. Structure of the cell phone gas sensor optics.

3.3 Electronics and user interface

The gas sensor electronics size was not minimized, because there is a large area in the backside of the cell phone which
can be used for electronics and batteries. Electronics and coin cell batteries can be seen in Figure 4. Electronics consist of
processor (Nordic Semiconductor nRF51822), detector preamplifier (LTC6240) and various power converters to
generate needed voltages for different components. Processor generates 10Hz modulation signal for light source and
performs AD-conversion from amplified detector signal and calculates signal levels in absorption band and reference
band. Processor also calculates CO2 concentration and controls the Bluetooth communication. The gas sensor sends CO2
concentration value with 1 second intervals to the cell phone via BluetoothSmart protocol. There is also a temperature
and humidity sensor (SI7021-A10) which values are also sent once in a second to the cell phone.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

Figure 4. Main electronics board and coin cell batteries integrated in the shield cover, gas sensor body is bottom of the shield cover,
ventilation holes makes possible to air flow to absorption path.

User interface (Figure 5) for the gas sensor is the cell phone. In user interface measurement can be started and stopped,
CO2 concentration is shown as a numeral value and color coded bar, also humidity and temperature values are presented
as a numerical value. The gas sensor power source is two coin cell batteries; therefore power consumption is minimized
by limiting measurement time for 30 seconds in one measurement. After 30 second the gas sensor goes to a sleep mode
and will wake up when measurement is started again.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

Figure 5. User interface of the gas sensor.

3.4 Mechanics
The demonstrator mechanics has been entirely made of 3D-printed plastic. The gas sensor without electronics is
presented in Figure 6, gas sensor body is in three parts and IR-emitter, sapphire lens, longpass filter, FPI and detector are
clued to these parts and finally three parts are clued together. The size of the gas sensor body is 10x10x53mm3. Size is
limited by PbSe-detector TO-can, which diameter is 9mm and length by optical path (23.5 mm) and stack of all the
components. The gas sensor body is located in bottom part of shield cover; there can be seen ventilation holes which
enables air flow to absorption path (Figure 4). The gas sensor could be realized in smaller size by using detector which is
not packaged to a TO-can. The FPI and detector could be stacked together and attached directly to a PCB. This way
could be avoided using large size detector component.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

Figure 6. Thee gas sensor meechanics withouut electronics. The

T body of the gas sensor consist of three parrts (upper image). IR-emitter,
sapphire lenss, longpass filterr, FPI PCB (witthout FPI in thee image) and deetector are cluedd to these parts and finally all three parts are
clued together (lower image). Size of the gass sensor body iss 10x10x53mm3.

4. ME
EASUREM
MENTS
The spectral transmission
t
o the MEMS
of
S FPI was meaasured with seeveral tuning voltages
v
from
m 0V to 13V (F
Figure 7). Thee
measurementt was done wiith a FT-IR sppectrometer (B
Bruker Vertex
x 70). The pulll-in-voltage of the FPI wass not achievedd,
thus transmission peak couuld be tuned evven shorter wavelength, but in this appliccation it was nnot needed, th
herefore tuningg
voltage was limited to 13V
V.
Measured traansmission peaak full-width-at-half-maxim
mum values (F
FWHM) were 60 80 nm (Figure 8). Thiis resolution iss
good for meaasuring CO2, because
b
absorpption band of the CO2 is verry wide (Figurre 1).

Figure 7. The spectral

s
transm
mission of the MEMS
M
FPI with several tuning voltages. Transsmission valuess are relative vaalues, maximum
m
was set to be 1.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

Figure 8. FW
WHM of the trannsmission peak as a function off the peak waveelength. Peak wavelength
w
was determinated as
a a position of
the traansmission maxximum with diffferent tuning vooltages.

The gas senssor was calibrrated with com

mmercial Vaiisala Carbocaap sensor. Traansmission off the CO2 wass measured inn
different concentrations annd then curvee was fitted too these measu
urement resultts. Fitted curvve was logaritthmic becausee
transmission depends on the
t concentrattion exponenttially (equatio
on 1). Transm
mission was m
measured by dividing
d
signaal
value on the absorption
a
bannd by signal which
w
was meeasured on thee reference bannd. Besides off the gas concentration, alsoo
light source emission
e
specctrum, detectoor sensitivity and
a FPI band width affect signal levels, but these factors are stablee
while gas conncentration chhanges. In thee testing of gaas sensor it waas found out that
t
noise meaasured in gas concentrationn
was approxim
mately 100 pppm. This is reelatively high value in com
mparison to noormal CO2 cooncentration, which is 4001000ppm. Reesponse time of
o the gas sennsor is short; itt reacts to breeathing or blow
wing in one seecond. Exhaleed air containss
high CO2 conncentration.

5. CONCLUSI
C
IONS
CO2 sensor enabling
e
gas measurements
m
with cell phoone has been demonstratedd. The gas sennsor is based on
o the MEMS
S
FPI developeed in VTT. This demonsstrator devicee shows the potential of MEMS FPI technology to
t enable gass
measurementts within mobiile devices. Benefits of thiss technology are
a low cost, small
s
size, low
w power consu
umption, goodd
stability and possibility
p
to measure
m
varioous spectral signatures.
Beside of CO
O2 also other gases could be
b measured with
w the MEM
MS FPI technoology. Limitinng size factorr is absorptionn
path length, therefore gases which havve strong absoorption (CO2) or high conncentration coould be measu
ured with thiss
technology. High
H
concentration gases coould be for exaample hydrocarbons in explosive concenntrations.
The gas senssor size couldd be further miniaturized
m
b using deteector chip witthout TO-cann. The MEMS
by
S FPI and thee
detector couldd be stacked together
t
and attached
a
directtly to a PCB. Detector
D
activve area could bbe smaller beccause aperturee
of the FPI is 0.8
0 mm. Noise of the detecttor is proportiional of the sq
quare root of detector
d
area, tthus smaller detector
d
wouldd
improve senssitivity of the sensor. Sensiitivity of the sensor
s
might be
b possible too improve by increasing lam
mp power andd
pulsing frequuency. Sensittivity could be
b improved also by mod
difying opticaal structure, bby adding seecond lens orr
increasing absorption path length.

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx

REFERENCES
[1] Blomberg M., Torkkeli A., Lehto, A., Helenelund, C., Viitasalo, M., Electrically tuneable micromachined
fabry-prot interferometer in gas analysis, Physica Scripta. Vol. T69 (1997), 119 121.
[2] Saari, H.; Mannila, R.; Antila, J.; Blomberg, M.; Rusanen, O.; Tenhunen, J.; Wolf, L.; Harnisch, B.
Miniaturised gas sensor using micromachined fabry-perot interferometer, Preparing for the Future, October
2000: European Space Agency, Noordwijk, The Netherlands. Vol. 10 (2000) No: 3, 4 5
[3] Mannila, Rami; Tuohiniemi, Mikko; Mkynen, Jussi; Nkki, Ismo; Antila, Jarkko, Hydrocarbon gas detection
with microelectromechanical Fabry-Perot interferometer, Next-Generation Spectroscopic Technologies VI, 29
- 30 April 2013, Baltimore, MD, United States, Proceedings of SPIE. SPIE. Vol. 8726 (2013)
[4] Mkynen , J., Tuohiniemi, M., Nsil, A., Mannila, R., Antila, J., "MEMS Fabry-Perot interferometer-based
spectrometer demonstrator for 7.5 m to 9.5 m wavelength range ", Proc. SPIE 8977, 89770U (2014).
[5] Sigrist M.; Air Monitoring by Spectroscopic Techniques, John Wiley & Sons, (1994), p.211.
[6] Gauglitz G, Vo-Dinh T., Handbook of Spectroscopy, Vol 1, John Wiley & Sons, (2008), pp 37 -152.
[7] Hodginson J., Tatam R. P., Optical gas sensing: a review, Measurement Science and Technology vol. 24 issue
1 January 01, (2013).
[8] HITRAN database, (2k version).

3URFRI63,(9RO3
Downloaded From: http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 06/17/2016 Terms of Use: http://spiedigitallibrary.org/ss/TermsOfUse.aspx