New automotive sensors reduce pollution levels
Currently, all vehicles incorporate one or more sensors to improve energy efficiency and reduce pollution. These sensors are essential for the proper functioning of catalysts, and thus their use is mandatory in most vehicles.
The Micro and Nanosystems Engineering Center (CEMIC) of the Department of Electronics of the Faculty of Physics (University of Barcelona, UB) has developed new automotive sensors in collaboration with the company Francisco Albero (FAE), a leading company in the automotive sector.
The development of these sensors enables the determination of the air-fuel stoichiometric mixture point (among other parameters), which results in the higher performance of the vehicle while reducing pollution levels. These new sensors are a planar oxygen sensor based on TiO2 nanotechnology on a ceramic substrate, and a planar ZrO2 lambda probe.
CEMIC and FAE have also collaborated in other fields: device testing, design of measurement systems, finite element simulations, machinery search, and design of clean rooms, among others.
At present, the company produces more than one hundred thousand probes per year with a turnover of over one million euros, and expects to produce more than two million probes within the next few years. The company continues to collaborate with the university in new technological challenges that will generate new products.
