Model and experimental characterization of dynamic behaviour of low power Carbon Monoxide MOX sensors with pulsed temperature profile

Wireless sensor networks for home automation require low-cost low-power sensors. Carbon Monoxide (CO) MOX sensors could be suitable concerning device cost; their limits concern the need to be heated, requiring a lot of power, and to be calibrated, increasing overall cost. This work investigates on behaviour of low-power CO MOX sensors with pulsed temperature profile by means of a double approach: sensor modeling and experimental evaluation. Analyzing how sensor thermal dynamic changes as a function of CO concentration yields to more information that can be used for diagnostic purposes or directly to estimate CO concentration. Particularly, two a-dimensional features have been tested to furnish an indication of CO concentration regardless any calibration. Results show effectiveness of the proposed approach.