Design and fabrication of a MEMS sensors array for detecting explosive particles

In this work, a design of MEMS sensors array which is capable of detecting explosive particles is presented. The array consists of 12 silicon beams, on each beam there are a heating element and a temperature sensing element. All silicon beams can be heated up to melting point of particular kind of explosive by the heating elements, while the sensing elements are used to monitor the temperature change of each beam caused by heat absorption of the explosive particles when they melt. The MEMS sensors array has been fabricated and tested, experimental results show that it is capable of detecting TNT and RDX particles of several micrograms.