A micromachined three-axis gas inertial sensor based on bidirectional thermal expansion flow

This paper reports a novel micromachined three-axis gas inertial sensor based on the bidirectional thermal expansion flow. Eight heaters and eight thermistors form a “cross-shape” network to generate bidirectional thermal expansion flows for the thermos-resistive sensing of each thermistor. Thus, the Z-axis angular rate and X/Y-axis acceleration can be sensed simultaneously with a sensitivity of 1.370mV/°/s within the range of [-3240°/s, +3240°/s], 2.183V/g and 1.916V/g within the range of [-1g, +1g], respectively. The couplings between X/Y acceleration measurements have decreased to 0.678% and 2.924% respectively.