Sensors

The first Volvo car equipped with an airbag left the assembly line in 1987 - and since then the company has extended the technology with several world-firsts. Volvo was first with both the seat-mounted side airbag and the Inflatable Curtain (IC) - and in 2012 the technology's 25th anniversary was celebrated with the introduction of the groundbreaking pedestrian airbag in the all-new Volvo V40.

ams has announced that their ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) for car seat occupancy detection systems is now entering high-volume production. Takata Corporation, the leading automotive safety systems supplier, will employ the ASIC in their occupant classification systems.

The new KTM 1190 Adventure and KTM 1190 Adventure R are the world's first motorcycles to feature Bosch Engineering’s new SU-MM5.10 lean-angle sensor as standard equipment. The sensor replaces the previous SU-MM3.10 model. It constantly supplies data on the motorcycle's driving dynamics, thus providing the basis for numerous safety and comfort functions and ensuring safer, more comfortable, and also more dynamic motorcycling.

Melexis introduces the first of its new line of commercial, off the shelf, packaged MEMs pressure sensors. The MLX90809 benefits from 10+ years of developing custom MEMs pressure sensors for demanding automotive applications. This device is a highly accurate, AEC Q100 qualified relative pressure sensor specifically targeted at 1 Bar applications. The company’s proprietary piezo-resistive MEMS technology combined with a high accuracy sensing...

Bosch has introduced the next generation of peripheral acceleration sensors for passenger protection systems in vehicles – the fifth since 1996. The key features of the new digital sensors include a wide measurement range of between ±120 g and ±480 g and the choice of communication via the SPI or the PSI5-V1.3 interface. Peripheral sensors are located at the outermost points of a vehicle's engine compartment, at the sides, or at the rear, thu...

Volvo Trucks has developed Collision Warning with Emergency Brake – an advanced emergency braking system equipped with early collision warning to help prevent severe accidents caused by inattention.

The tiny SHTC1 humidity and temperature sensor is specifically designed for mobile devices where size is a critical factor. Sensirion has rigorously followed the maxim smaller is better” and developed the world’s smallest sensor in its class, measuring a mere 2 x 2 x 0.8 mm.

System cost is a factor in deciding whether to use a sensor hub, points out Ian Chen, Executive Vice President of Sensor Platforms, a US startup which develops hardware agnostic sensor fusion software. Sensor Platforms’ FreeMotion library of software algorithms and middleware supports all major mobile microprocessors and all sensors used in smartphones and tablets.

The complex algorithms used by platforms such as the iNEMO Engine to combine the outputs of multiple sensors obviously require processing power; in the iNEMO Engine development boards this is done on a separate ST microcontroller. But why is this ‘sensor hub’ configuration becoming the norm rather than using central processing resources such as the application processor?

Sensor fusion is becoming a popular technique for increasing the accuracy and useability of data from MEMS sensors in smartphones and other consumer devices. In essence, the technique involves combining data from multiple sensors to produce a faster and more accurate representation of what is happening outside the system.